


The Gravity Of Duties Or The Ground Speed Of Joy

by splash_the_cat



Series: A World With So Many Things Worth Believing In [1]
Category: Jupiter Ascending (2015)
Genre: Destiny, F/M, Found Family, Gen, Space Opera, hard choices
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-14
Updated: 2018-02-23
Packaged: 2018-07-15 02:30:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 29,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7202669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/splash_the_cat/pseuds/splash_the_cat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Pretty much my id wallowing in bite-sized post-movie imaginings, in the vein of VR_Trakowski's excellent "Rise" and gallifreyburning's "The Journey of a Thousand Miles." Posting in chapters because this is the first in a series of which I have smaller pieces mostly already written, and I'd like to post those before forever. This won't be more than 10 chapters, probably less (the end is in fact already written!).

_“What kind of scale compares the weight of two beauties, the gravity of duties, or the ground speed of joy? Tell me, what kind of gauge can quantify elation? What kind of equation could I possibly employ?” -Ani DiFranco_

The Aegis cruiser maneuvered far more delicately than Jupiter expected given its size and configuration, gently scooping them into a hanger. A slight tug of gravity took hold and they drifted gently down to the deck before her full weight settled back onto her bones. Caine did something to the emergency space suit thing and it literally melted off her before clanking to the floor, now nothing more than a small box-shape joined seconds later by Caine's.

The door to the hold slid open and a cheering group of Aegis personnel poured inside, led by a more subdued but still-smiling Captain Tsing and a very subdued but relieved-looking Stinger.

Caine had told her, while they waited for the cruiser to bring them in, just a little of what had happened, and Jupiter saw Stinger like a multiple exposure: here, face blank, shoulders hunched, hands behind his back; on Orous, gun trained on a betrayed Caine, flush with determination and regret and anguish and hope; in her destroyed living room, at her back, rock-steady and ready to charge.

Jupiter shook Tsing's hand and thanked her, and did the same for each of the crew crowded around her, and when Stinger made to melt into the tiny crowd she caught the hem of his jacket.

"Majesty," he started, hands up, but she grabbed one hand and squeezed.

"Caine told me. We'll figure it out," she said. "When Kiza's okay, we'll figure it out."

He nodded once, twice, then grabbed her shoulder and dragged her in for a quick, hard embrace. She stepped back when he released her and kept going right over backward as her head swam and her knees turned to jelly.

Caine caught her. He eased her down to sit on the deck and knelt at her side. She tipped into him, whatever rush of adrenaline that carried her through the few hours swirled down a drain, and everything just throbbed - her back, leg, arms. "Oh, ow."

"Easy," he said and she wanted to burrow into him, but something wet smeared against her cheek; she pulled away to see the mangled ruin of his shoulder.

"Oh my God, Caine." She batted away his questing hands as he patted over her and tried to get to her feet. "What happened? We need to get you to a doctor!"

"Why don't we get you both to the infirmary," came Stinger's dry interjection, and she and Caine both looked up to see him roll his eyes.

Caine insisted on supporting her to the Aegis infirmary, with Stinger and Mr. Percadium and Captain Tsing rounding out the escort. She knew he'd prefer to just scoop her up, and by the third corridor she regretted not allowing him to, but he'd carried her so much, and he was hurt, despite his insistence that he was fine; she saw how deep those gashes went, saw the torn muscle and the pull across his mouth when he moved that arm. But she did let him lift her onto the medical bed, because she wasn't sure she'd be able to climb up onto it without ending right back on the floor, and she didn't complain when he helped her lie back, or removed her boots.

But when the doctor approached with a glowing blue canister she sat up, recoiling. "No!"

The doctor was confused. Stinger and Percadium and Tsing were confused. Caine was too, but his brow furrowed and his mouth opened a little - scenting the air, no scenting _her_ \- her panic, revulsion and shame probably like a neon sign blazing over her head.

He exchanged a look with Stinger, and then like dominoes Stinger turned to Tsing, who turned to the doctor, who eyed Jupiter warily and slowly set the Regenex canister aside.

"We have other methods, though their results are not as quick," he said

"That's fine," she told him, "totally fine." One less thing she'd have nightmares about.

The alternative was a wand that emitted a faint buzz, not unlike the drone of Stinger's bees, that sent a wave of warmth through all the aches and bruises purpling up, and some kind of liquid band-aid stuff that sealed over the scrapes and cuts on her skin.

Caine had pushed away all attempts to get him to another medbed until the doctor declared her okay, and when the doctor approached him with the canister of RegeneX, he hesitated, and with a quick glance at Jupiter, shook his head. A sick little knot hardened in her stomach at how easily he followed her lead, despite his pain, a knot that burned with the reminder of Titus' scorn at her naivety, at the sheer scope of this new world and its complex horrors.

"It's okay," she said. "Caine, take it. Please." Only then did he relent, allowing the doctor to press him back onto a bed, tsking at the mess of his shoulder as the doctor cut away the ruined shirt.

Jupiter laid back on the infirmary bed, head pillowed on her hand, and watched Caine as he watched her. She blinked and everything faded into night.

Her footsteps echoed a counterpoint to the frantic drum of her heart as she walked the great hall to Balem, but she never got close, and he just sat there framed by the roiling blood-red guts of the world she was named for, sat there holding a long thin knife like a needle to her mother's throat, still so far away even when she ran, feet pounding, a stitch in her side like the point of that knife, breath gasping as she yelled incoherent pleas and then the night-black floor crumbled away and Jupiter fell, kept falling and falling and someone watched her, someone calm, serene and cold as marble, someone with her face, watched her all the way down-

She burst awake to quiet and the faint glow of starlight. In that light she saw Caine seated at the opposite end of the bed alcove, angled so he rested against the alcove wall, his booted feet hanging off the edge, one large hand curled around her ankle like a warm, firm anchor. "Easy, you're okay. You're safe."

She gulped in the comforting stale, recycled air of the Aegis cruiser - no perfumes, or incense or the stench of burning wires and blood - and concentrated on Caine's thumb rubbing soft circles against the knob of bone. "How long was I out?"

"A few hours." His thumb shifted to rub along the top of her foot. "What were you dreaming?"

"Falling." Jupiter stared at his hand on her, her heart slowing to match the gentle strokes of his thumb. "I'm tired of falling."

Caine crawled up next to her, curled around her. "I'll always catch you."

"I know," and she did - he'd come after her after all, come after her into that terrible storm - she was saving that astonishment and what it meant for later, when she could understand it, appreciate it, could thank him without the fear that still trickled like ice through her veins. "It's just..."

"You're safe." He repeated it again and again, and she realized he was reminding himself as much as her, and she closed her eyes and sank back under again, lulled by the soft whuff of his breath against her face and the steady certainty of his voice.

"You're safe. I'm here."

*****

The next morning she went home.

She left Caine at the end of her street, the warmth of his mouth lingering on her lips from a kiss; this one unhurried, without the specter of it maybe being the only one.

"I will be nearby," he said into her hair as he seated something behind her ear. "Temporary com," he explained. "Tap it once to contact me, three times if you need help."

"I need all the help," Jupiter said and squeezed him hard before stepping back. "We need to get you a phone. Texting will be way less conspicuous." Still, she loved the idea of having that connection to him and gently touched the tiny round piece of metal hidden by her hair, still warm from his fingers.

Caine sketched her a tiny bow. "As you wish, your Majesty."

The house sat silent when she crept inside. Captain Tsing had assured her that her family would wake normally, with no memory of their ordeal. Still, Jupiter snuck upstairs and peeked in on Moltka and Mikka, and listened at Vassily and Irina's door for Vassily's bellowing snores.

She had maybe 20 minutes before her mother's alarm sounded, enough time to get inside, crawl into bed and pretend nothing happened.

Jupiter stood in the kitchen, still saturated with the smell of dinner, of coffee, of home. No, she couldn't pretend that. Not when she'd lived a lifetime in the span of days, a fast-forward glimpse into so many possible futures that her head spun if she thought about it too hard. It would, in some ways, be so much easier to forget, to have Captain Tsing do to her whatever they'd done to her family. But there was Caine. And Stinger and Kiza. And an empire on the brink of transformation, waiting for her.

She could not, would not pretend, not entirely, so she rummaged through the basket of laundry by the basement door, dressed in the tiny hall bathroom, and started the coffee.

*******

Three days later she ducked out between houses, making promises she'd meet Mama and Nino at their 3:00, that she needed to run an errand: "A personal errand, oh my God, okay, do you want me to tell you the sordid state of my possible yeast infection?"

Caine sat on a bench in the little park a few blocks from the 3:00 house. He wore worn jeans and a flannel shirt that pulled tight across his broad shoulders and a little knit beanie that looked ridiculous and adorable and possibly nefarious in the summer heat, and he still had his boots and gloves, and a small, wonderful smile when he looked over his shoulder as she approached.

She sat next to him and tipped into his side. "Hi."

"Hi," he said, and she felt his breath in her hair. "Are you well?"

"Yeah," she said. "Better now." They'd spoken a few times, quick conversations over the tiny com thing as Jupiter had skulked around the house to avoid prying ears and questions, just a few sparse words to convince Caine she was in one piece and convince her he wasn't a dream. She slipped an arm around his and buried her face against his shoulder.

"Hey," he said, and now she felt gentle fingers stroking through her hair.

"I'm fine," she insisted into the soft flannel. "Really. Did you raid Stinger's closet?"

"Kiza supplied them. She said black leathers would look suspicious in these areas, but she didn't have a lot to work with." Caine was enough bigger than Stinger that the jeans looked painted on. It was a very good look on him.

"How is she? How are they?"

"Good. They left yesterday for Orous. Kiza will get her recode priority, thanks to your intervention."

Jupiter shrugged. She still hadn't quite sorted out how she felt about Stinger selling her and Caine out, but when Captain Tsing had let slip that even with the money from Titus, it would still be months before Kiza would get her treatment, Jupiter had decided it was as good a chance as any to test her new queenly credentials. "Captain Tsing did all the work."

"It was still kindly done."

She let that lie. "When will they be back?"

"About a week. While Kiza's getting her recode, Stinger's going to file our pardons and the request for your guard assignment with the Legion. He thinks he can use money from Titus to fast track everything so we can get our wings, too, without having to wait until we rotate back into rank."

"What about-" the words went dry in her mouth at the implications. Caine had his pardon. Caine would go back to the Legion to get his wings. Caine would go back to the Legion, to the Skyjackers, to his life that was stolen from him.

It made no sense, the sudden gaping pit in her chest. She'd known him for like a _week_. Why did the thought of him leaving feel like the world was falling out from under her again?

"- and once the pardons clear the system, and we have our wings, Stinger's going to submit my request for a transfer out. He thinks they won't give him too much trouble if he can drop your name a few times."

Jupiter blinked up at him. "Transfer?"

The corner of his mouth quirked up. "You didn't hear a word I said, did you?" Amusement, not irritation.

Jupiter yanked her arm from his and so she could cross hers. "I was possibly occupied with panicking that you would leave. With your pardon. Like you said you wanted."

He had the good grace to look sheepish. "What I wanted, I didn't think I could have."

"Because I'm royalty. And you're a splice."

Caine tugged at the hem of his glove. It was a little strange seeing him fiddle anxiously. "Because I've never gotten anything I haven't had to fight for, to kill for. And then you stood there, and offered me your throat..."

It was Jupiter's turn for chagrin. "I did come on kind of strong."

The laugh he let out was gentle, and settled into a genuine smile, enough to show the tips of his canines, so she didn't begrudge it - she liked the look of it on him too much. "You were nothing I've ever imagined, and I, well, panicked."

She couldn't begrudge him that, either. It's not like his life these last few days hadn't been as much of a dizzying whirl as hers. "And now?"

Caine shifted so he faced her and gently uncrossed her arms. He cupped her hands in his: kissed her knuckles, the base of her thumb, the pulse in her wrist. "I didn't come back for you only to leave you again. I will stay with you as long as you will have me."

The rush of elation burst out of her as, "Oh, thank God!" as she launched herself against his chest, cheek smushed against the soft flannel, inexplicably close to tears when his arms settled around her.

"Jupiter, I can't promise I'm not going to fuck up. I can't even promise that I won't-" He swallowed hard. "Remember that I don't know what happened. I don't know that it won't happen again. I don't know that I'm-"

"Hey, no." She untangled herself and held his chin, forcing him to look at her. "You're amazing, that's what you are. Astonishing. Outstanding. I could go on at length, embarrassingly so."

His cheeks flushed. "It's still a risk."

Jupiter slid her palm along the line of his jaw, pressed her thumb to the corner of his mouth, drawing him down. His lips were so soft and warm under hers. "You're worth it," she said against them, and kissed him again.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.
> 
> _“What kind of scale compares the weight of two beauties, the gravity of duties, or the ground speed of joy? Tell me, what kind of gauge can quantify elation? What kind of equation could I possibly employ?” -Ani DiFranco_

Despite Vassily's accusations that Jupiter spent her wages frivolously, one of her annual purchases was an Anytime All Access Pass to the Adler Planetarium (though, knowing Vassily, he'd consider that just as frivolous as the box of shoes under her bed). In the winter she only went once a month or so, when they had a house sort of nearby and she could sneak off between houses, or convince her mom and Aunt Nino to drop her off on their way home, so she'd only have to make the long trek one way in the cold and dark.

In summer, though, she'd go at least once a week, usually Wednesdays to try and avoid the weekend tourist crowds, but if they had a house nearby, or she convinced Vladie to drive her in the general vicinity, she'd go as often as possible without getting the side-eye for any appearances of shirking work. It usually meant she only got an hour, if even that, but she clung to those precious minutes.

The planetarium was her safe space to dream, to pretend she was more than she was, an irony she wasn't sure she appreciated so much now, sitting in the star show with Caine, hoping he wasn't bored to death by banal Earth astronomy when he'd seen more stars and planets that she'd ever imagined possible.

"I wasn't bored," he insisted as they sat on the breakwater below the planetarium, Caine sniffing at the snowcone she'd gotten him from a vendor (cherry - even though the blue was her favorite, the hue was a little unsettling now).

"This is all sucrose," he said, licking delicately at the mound of ice before consuming half of it in one bite.

"That is the beauty of it." Jupiter slurped some of the syrup from her own cone and stuck her tongue out at Caine, which he eyed suspiciously.

"Is it supposed to do that?"

Jupiter pulled her phone out and thumbed on the camera. "Open wide." Caine obediently stuck out his tongue and Jupiter snapped the picture, handing him the phone.

"That can't be healthy," he said, carefully examining the image of his bright-red tongue.

"That is also the beauty of it," Jupiter said, and took a giant bite of hers just as Caine said:

"So Stinger and Kiza come back tomorrow, and I need to leave on their transport."

Jupiter swallowed the entire mouthful of shaved ice, the cold burning in her throat. She managed, barely, not to choke on it, though her eyes watered and the two attempts it took to get the words out ruined her nonchalant, "Oh, wow, already?"

"It won't take more than two weeks, probably less. But I can wait if you'd prefer." The earnest concern that coated his words made her sigh. She got up and dumped the rest of her snowcone in a nearby trash can and came back to stand before him.

"Sorry, I'm being ridiculous. Go, get your wings back." She smiled; his shoulders straightened at the mention of his wings. "I'll survive."

He gulped the rest of his cone, neatly folded the paper cup, and set it aside to take her hands. "Stinger will watch out for you."

"Caine, I'll be fine. Really."

"It's for my benefit as much as yours. I'll feel better about leaving know that you're safe."

"Okay," Jupiter said. He had a little smear of syrup under his lip, and she started to wipe it away with her thumb, but instead tipped his chin up and licked it away. He let out a sound somewhere between a sigh and a groan, said, " _Your Majesty_ ," and pulled her into his lap, mouth hot on hers. Jupiter forgot where they were for a few minutes until a muttered "Get a room," from a passing jogger passing broke the heat of the moment.

"Sorry," Caine said, though he clearly wasn't.

Not that Jupiter was, either. She kissed him again, slow, soft, rocking her hips a little when she realized he was hard under her, and her underwear was already wet and slick. A week. She'd known him just over a _week_. But everything about their relationship had already happened on fast forward, so... "Caine," she said, suddenly a little breathless, a little dizzy at the thought of him, his mouth, his hands... "do you want-"

" _Yes._ " He nuzzled under her chin, inhaling deep, and Jupiter remembered that he'd tracked her down by scent, that he could probably smell-

"Fuck," Jupiter said. "Caine, where-"

"The tower." He stood, setting her on her feet with one more kiss and a sharp nip to her bottom lip that made her want to climb him right then and there. Instead, she grabbed his hand and charged off down the walkway.

"Seriously," she said, juggling her phone to check traffic reports, wondering if it would be faster to flag down a cab; the bright, clear afternoon sky killed the idea of flying until they at least got into downtown proper among the taller buildings. "Space gates and immortality and flying gravity boots, but you all still haven't figured out teleportation?"

 

******

  
Stinger watching out for her turned out to be Stinger sleeping in his truck a few blocks from her house. It took her three days to really notice the battered, ancient blue pick-up parked three streets over one day, down the block the next, around the corner on the third day.

"You and Stinger are okay?" Jupiter had asked Caine that evening before he'd left, sprawled against him in his little hideout nest in the tower, drowsy and sated, sweat-slicked and delightfully sore.

"Okay enough," he'd replied. "We'll sort out the details eventually." He'd licked under the swell of her breast, breathing deep, biting gently. "I'd have done the same thing in his position. Kin ties like that aren't something many splices have, and they're precious." Wriggling lower, Caine had rested his chin on her hip. "Are you... are you going to be okay with him?"

"I guess," she'd said when Caine's steady gaze had wavered at her long pause. "I mean, I get it, I do." And she did, mostly. She'd almost made the same choice, almost traded the Earth for her family, and still wondered sometimes if her decision would have been different if the scale of her choice had been smaller, or if it hadn't been her world for her family. Would she have traded the life of a stranger, especially one who she had no reason to trust, someone she possibly expected to betray her, based on experience?

She'd run her fingers through Caine's hair, trying to sooth the tension she felt building in him, and tugged gently; he'd crawled back up and settled over her as she pulled him down for a kiss. "Kiza's going to be okay, and we're okay, and that's what's important."

And if he noticed that she'd never actually answered his question, he had let it lie.

The fourth morning Jupiter stole out of the house early, cradling one of Vladie's dozen of crappy promotional travels mugs, filled to the brim with coffee. Stinger saw her coming, of course, but sat unmoving in the driver's seat as she dragged open the creaky passenger door and handed him the cup before she climbed in.

He buried his face in it and Jupiter bit at her lip and said, "How's Kiza?"

"Fine," he said into the cup, staring straight ahead out of the windshield before he sighed. "She's doing very well, Majesty. Thank you for asking, and for this."

Jupiter shrugged. "It's the least I could do. This can't be a comfortable watch post."

That got a small chuckle. "Truth told, it's not bad at all, compared to some I've experienced."

"You don't need to do this. I'll be fine, you know."

Stinger shook his head. "Not only would Caine skin my hide, but I wouldn't be comfortable leaving you unwatched. Not after..." He escaped back into the cup of coffee.

After what, she wanted to ask? After Titus? After he'd been so kind, so patient as the world heaved and pitched under her feet? And that was the worst part. He'd been _kind_ , yet it burned, it burned like rage that Caine had almost died, that _she'd_ almost died (burned like shame that she'd been the one to put herself in that position).

Is this, she wondered, how it would always be between her and Stinger, everything circling back to Titus, to everything terrible he represented between them?

That burned too.

The silence swelled until she felt too crowded. She shoved open the door and slid out of the truck.

"Majesty..." Stinger's voice followed her out. "I want you to know... If it would please you... it's not much, well, it's a shithole, but my home is yours, if you wish, if you need it."

"I don't." The words startled out of her and Stinger's face froze into a blank, empty mask.

"Of course. Forgive my presumption."

"Wait, wait, that's not-" Jupiter clambered back into the truck and grabbed his hand. "Can I come out on weekends? And maybe, if you have time, could you tell me more about, well, everything? There's so much, I don't even know where to start and I need..." She closed her eyes and drew a breath and relaxed her death grip on his hand. "I do need it."

A ghost of touch brushed her cheek and she opened her eyes to see grief, and hope, in Stinger's. "Well, if that's how it is, then I guess I can make the time."

 

*******

 

Jupiter got up and cleaned three houses with her mother and Nino that next Saturday morning, and with the excuse that she was going to help Katherine Dunleavy for a few days at Katherine's request (who had replied to Jupiter's frantic text with three smiley emoji, a thumbs up emoji, five question marks, "IS HE CUTE?" and a camera emoji) she stuffed some things in a bag and ducked out of the house before anyone could examine her cover story too closely.

Stinger sat in his truck one block over, and handed her a Starbucks cup with her name written in bold script - the barista had even sketched a credible version of the planet under her name. "Thanks," she said, "you're a lifesaver," and Stinger replied, "Of course, Majesty."

They drove in silence after that, the roar and rattle of the old truck a good excuse for it. Jupiter nursed her coffee and watched the city fade into fields and long stretches of road, one world transformed into another.

At the farm Stinger vanished once he ushered her in and showed her to a neatly appointed bedroom - complete with a worn wooden rocking chair and a white metal frame bed topped with a colorful quilt - muttering something about the hives and the bees, a handful of which had followed Jupiter in and through the house, and now made orbits around her like a string of tiny moons.

There was no sign of Kiza, and Jupiter puttered around, feeling at loose ends. Eventually she and gravitated to the kitchen, where Stinger found her two hours later, cleaning out the cabinets - having done all the dishes, cleaned out the refrigerator and dusted the jars and jugs of honey that glowed amber and gold in the summer sunlight that streamed through the (also cleaned) kitchen windows.

"This isn't what I had in mind when I offered you my home, Majesty."

Jupiter ducked out of the cabinet she'd been scrubbing and sat back on her heels. She shoved the hair that had escaped her sloppy pony-tail from her sweaty forehead. "Well, if I am supposed to be treating it like home...." She bit back the sudden defensiveness and embarrassment that turned sour on her tongue. "Sorry, I didn't mean... I didn't know what else to do."

He reached out a hand and hauled her to her feet, brushing dust from her hair. "Kiza'd be appalled that an Entitled was scrubbing our floors." He gently pushed her toward the kitchen table and she sank into a chair with a muttered "I haven't done the floors yet," as he set about filling the ancient coffee maker on the counter.

"How is Kiza?" Jupiter finally asked, picking at the jagged edge of a fingernail she'd torn. "Where is she?"

"Well," he said. "She's at school. She'll be home soon. She..." He pressed the button and the coffee maker began to burble and burp. "She doesn't know. What I did. She doesn't... She just knows you paid for her treatment. I..." He gripped the edge of the counter hard enough that Jupiter could see from there that his knuckles were white.

Jupiter understood, a little, what it must be to make that kind of choice to save your child. She saw it in her mother's eyes sometimes, heard it between the words of the stories Nino told of her father, and of their flight from Russia.

"I won't say anything," Jupiter said, and Stinger nodded to the coffee maker and said, "Thank you."


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.
> 
> _“What kind of scale compares the weight of two beauties, the gravity of duties, or the ground speed of joy? Tell me, what kind of gauge can quantify elation? What kind of equation could I possibly employ?” -Ani DiFranco_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I swear the rest is much happier! This will (probably) be the single longest chunk of the story.

The next morning a sharp rap on the bedroom door woke her from a muzzy dream of falling. Stinger ambled in at her grumbled, "What?" cupping a mug of coffee that he presented to her with a tiny bow. 

"Company en-route, Majesty."

Jupiter struggled out of the twist of sheet and quilt and tried not to outright lunge for the coffee. She blew on it and took one scalding gulp before she said, "What kind of company?"

"From your House."

Panic burned as hot as the coffee for a moment at the thought of her mother charging up the driveway and she blinked at Stinger until she realized he meant capital "H" house, as in Abrasax. "Wait, what? Already? I haven't done anything yet. I haven't even really talked to anybody about anything-" A whole new kind of panic welled like bile in her throat. "Is this about the refinery and Balem?" 

"Easy, Majesty." Stinger sat on the edge of the bed and laid a hand on her shoulder. "He says he's the House Steward, entrusted with managing Seraphi's estate."

"Trusted, or," and Jupiter made finger quotes with the hand not clutched around the cup, "'entrusted' himself?"

"Smart money's always on the latter in these cases, Majesty."

"Fantastic," Jupiter muttered into the cup, and Stinger patted her on the shoulder.

"You've got time. Commune with that," he gestured to the coffee cup, "and I'll stall them."

Guilt didn't allow her much time to commune. She finished off the coffee in a few more gulps while she contemplated her very-lacking wardrobe options for an official meeting,eventually just shrugging into a t-shirt and jeans. She stuffed her feet into her sneakers, and snagging the empty cup, headed downstairs.

She found Stinger on the porch, watching a little spaceship hover near the edge of the cornfield. A blue beam speared down, one of those transport things, and deposited two figures before the little ship rose higher and shot off into the sky, wavering into invisibility before it reached the clouds. 

A few bees whirled around her, then more in wide spirals - like a shield she realized - as the figures approached. The tall one wore a deep black robe edged with glimmering, shifting gold, and had horns like a bighorn sheep, curled up on the sides of his head, polished to a brilliant shine. The other one was slight, and Jupiter thought he might be the same kind of splice as Titus' assistant. His face was drawn, his shoulder hunched, a stark contrast to the haughty bearing of what Jupiter figured was his boss.

Big Boss Sheep Guy stopped at the foot of the porch stairs and glared up at Jupiter and Stinger. He dismissed Jupiter with a sniff and pinned Stinger with a look of barely concealed distaste. "I assume you are the one to whom I spoke earlier. Take us to her Majesty immediately."

Jupiter blinked as Stinger covered a snort of laughter with a very feigned cough. Junior Lawyer, who carried five sheaves in a neat stack, peered up at her, nose scrunched as they climbed the steps.

Stinger stepped aside and gestured them into the house. She jerked her head toward the living room at Stinger's questioning brow and collected cups, honey, milk, a tray, and the still mostly-full pot of coffee from the coffee maker as Stinger situated the visitors in the other room. Balancing the loaded tray, Jupiter passed Stinger in the doorway and he gave her a tiny bow and a whispered, "Enjoy."

Jupiter bit back a sour, "Gee thanks," and set the tray on the little coffee table with a sickly sweet smile. "Coffee?"

Big Boss Sheep Guy curled his lip into a magnificent sneer. "I do not have time for these provincial pleasantries. I will speak to her Majesty now."

Junior Lawyer, who had tracked her closely as she came in, opened his eyes wide and let out the faintest squeak. "Sir," he whispered, "she's, that's-"

Big Boss Sheep Guy sliced a hand right in front of Junior Lawyer's nose. "Enough. I am on very important business. I will speak to the queen now." 

"Sure," Jupiter said. "Totally don't want to inconvenience you or anything." She settled on the worn armchair across from him. "So, what did you need with me?" 

Junior Lawyer shoved one of his sheaves at Big Boss Sheep Guy, who glanced at it, at Jupiter, back at the sheave and again at Jupiter, his mouth hanging wide and his ears wiggling furiously. He recovered impressively, she'd give him that, clearing his throat and imperiously stating, "Queen Seraphi-"

"Ah," Jupiter mimicked his chopping gesture. "Before we get any further, introductions are in order." She tapped her chest. "Jupiter Jones. Seraphi's recurrence. _Not_ Seraphi. Okay?"

Big Boss Sheep Guy harrumphed, but nodded. "Of course, your Majesty. I am Senior Advocate Bith Gembel, primary proctor of her Majesty Seraphi Abrasax's estate. Now, I understand that you are a new..." He faltered as Jupiter blinked at him and inclined her head toward Junior Lawyer.

"Dev, your Majesty," Junior Lawyer spoke out softly into an awkwardly long pause where Gembel's nostrils flared and he stared, baffled, at Jupiter. "Subsidiary Advocate Devri Scofl." He sat straight and held himself so still Jupiter wondered if he was even breathing until he swallowed convulsively when Jupiter smiled at him. He returned it shyly and started to hand her one of the sheaves when Gembel snatched it from him, the string of his attention snapped back from the comical stretching of his incredulity.

"As I was saying, your Majesty," Advocate Gembel intoned, "I understand that you are a very new recurrence, and given your tertiary upbringing, that you may not understand all the implications of your august advancement into this new realm, and I want to make it clear that I am uniquely positioned to assist your continued elevation."

Jupiter caught sight of Stinger lounging in the doorway to the kitchen, smothering a grin with his hand. Dev had closed his eyes, his top lip curled in, the picture of mortification. Jupiter poured out two cups of coffee. She pointedly handed one to Dev, who took it slowly, and picked up the other, spooning in some honey. Gembel blinked when she turned the empty cup over before lifting the other full cup, taking a sip, enjoying it as much as the dawning realization that slid across Gembel's face that he'd, quite possibly, _royally_ fucked up.

"Those were a lot of big words, Senior Advocate. Just so I'm perfectly clear, given my tertiary upbringing and all, " Jupiter tapped her spoon on the edge of the mug, the sound ringing loudly in the sudden silence that fell at the chill in her tone. She drew herself up and pinned him with the icy glare her mother used on all the jerks who spoke to her like she was stupid. "Did you just call me a backwater yokel who is too dumb to understand what has happened to me?" 

A low drone built, and one by one bees circled her until they spun like a living crown above her head. 

Gembel's mouth snapped shut, then creaked open with a drawn out, "I... I... your Majesty... that's not... I mean..."

Jupiter shook her head. "Thank you, Mr. Gembel, but I think I will manage just fine without you. Stinger, if you would show him out, please."

"Your Majesty, this is unprecedented and uncalled for and I-" 

He clamped his mouth shut when Stinger got right up in his face. "I believe her Majesty was quite clear that she no longer wanted your services." The remark was quiet, friendly, and Jupiter clearly heard the steel and blood under it.

"Well, then." Gembel rose slowly under that hard, golden gaze. "Come, Devri."

"Actually," Jupiter said, "he's welcome to stay, if he'd like." 

Dev, halfway to his feet, froze. His wide eyes swung between Jupiter and Gembel; the sheaves clattered against each other in his shaking hands as he sank back down to the worn sofa. He looked, Jupiter thought, like a deer in the headlights, watching Stinger herd his boss out of the room.

"Oh my God," Jupiter clapped a hand over her mouth. "Did I just get you fired? He was so- I just wanted-" Help sat on the back of her tongue, but Jupiter couldn't force the word out, because it wasn't exactly true. She'd wanted to show up Gembel for being a jerk. 

With a groan she slumped against the back of the chair, setting off a buzzing jumble among the bees as she disturbed their coronal circuit. "He's right. I am _useless_ at all this. I'm so sorry. I had no right to do that."

"What?" Dev blinked a few times as his focus returned to Jupiter. "Oh no, hardly, your Majesty," he said, flustered at her sudden self-flagellation. "My contract is held by the House, and while he can certainly make my life a miserable experience by consigning me to filing for the remainder of it, technically you're the only one who can, as you so colorfully describe it, fire me by releasing my from my contract."

"Okay," Jupiter said, somewhat mollified. She sat forward, setting off another furor of buzzing around her head. "So how do I fix this and make sure that you don't get sent to filing hell?"

Dev cocked his head, regarding her for a long moment before he said, "You would simply need to transfer me, either to another department in the House advocacy service." He took a deep breath, and the next came out in a rush, his ears twitching: "Or to your personal retinue if it would please you."

"Retinue?" Jupiter blinked. "I don't have a retinue."

"Well then, If I may, your Majesty, this is an excellent time to start gathering one."

Glancing at Stinger - who had returned to stand sentinel in the doorway - only got her a shrug and a raised eyebrow. Jupiter chewed on her bottom lip. "What do you want?"

Dev mimicked her earlier delaying tactic, stirring honey into the cup of coffee he'd previously set aside, and made a pleased little noise in his throat when he took a small drink of it. "May I first ask you something, your Majesty?"

"Of course."

"Why did you say I could stay?"

"Honestly?" Jupiter sighed. "I wanted to one-up Gembel," she admitted, "because he was so condescending, and I guess I thought I was, I don't know, protecting you, despite, you know, not knowing anything about your situation. Plus, you weren't a jerk."

Dev's cheeks pinked. "That... does not seem like the best qualification for what you need, your Majesty." 

"Trust me. It's a very high qualification in my mind." Jupiter countered with, "Why did you stay?"

He traded the cup for one of the sheaves, fiddling with the controls. "Well, to be honest," he said with a small smile, "you weren't, as you so colorfully put it, a jerk." He held out the sheave and when she took it, said, "It would be my honor to serve you, Queen Jupiter."

On the sheave was his contract, the amendment to transfer it to her personal service above the little window for her to seal it, with her mark. She closed her eyes, but the image of the last sheave she'd held awaiting her seal remained burned into her mind. "Just because I'm not a jerk?"

Dev ducked his head, but the smile she caught was genuine and pleased at the small teasing. It is, I have been told, an excellent qualification."

Jupiter held her wrist over the sheave, and it beeped a cheerful trill. "Okay. Welcome aboard."

*****

With only a small amount of grumbling, Stinger gave over run of his library of sheaves and the kitchen table to the inauguration of Jupiter's royal household. Within an hour of sealing Dev's contract, he'd assembled neatly organized piles of sheaves detailing various sociological and historical events and treatises that complemented the astonishing amount of data he'd brought about Jupiter's inherited empire.

"Good call, Majesty, keeping that one around. Probably won't even need me, now," Stinger said later that day, as he and Jupiter sat on the porch, Jupiter draining her second glass of iced tea, blinking into the late afternoon sunlight. Dev had chased her out with a sigh when she'd dozed off on the sheave he'd handed her a few minutes before. "With all due respect, your Majesty," he'd said after she'd snapped awake when he'd gingerly tapped her shoulder, "while I admire your enthusiasm, you cannot learn this all today." 

Jupiter yawned enormously and finished the last swallow of her drink. Dev was a diligent tutor and he was also right. Her head spun trying to process the scope of what he laid out for her: accounts totaling astronomical sums of money, dozens of estates (which she realized was Entitled speak for entire _planets_ ) scattered across the galaxy, the Entitled equivalent of stocks tied up in resources that were straight out of science fiction, entire industries related to the production of Regenex, and worst in some ways, the one that left her queasy, _thousands_ of contracts for the splices that had kept the machinery of Seraphi's estate running.

Suddenly her life cleaning toilets looked enticingly uncomplicated and delightful.

"You all right?"

Jupiter blinked down into her glass. "I honestly don't know." Questions - about how he worked for the Aegis, if they held his contract, if he had a contract, what their pardon meant for Stinger's role in the Legion, what it mean for Caine and Caine's place in her life - crowded in her throat and she swallowed them down with the dregs in her glass and set it down to run her hands through her hair, working it into a loose knot at the back of her neck. "It's a lot. The information. The implications of it..."

They were terrifying.

She rose creakily. "And on that note, I should get back to it. Dev thinks it's only a matter of time before Titus retaliates, or before one of the other Entitled houses thinks they can try and fill the vacuum left by Balem's..." She shook her head and bent to retrieve her glass.

"I'll take care of that." Stinger picked it up but she grabbed it out of his hand.

"No. It's okay." He stared up at her and she felt heat in her face. How to explain how she needed the little things like washing the dishes to keep herself grounded, that the last few hours had her feeling like if she stepped wrong, she'd simply be flung free of Earth's gravity, lost to the vast, endless universe. Bees gathered around her, mirroring her agitation as Stinger stood.

He nudged free a bee that had gotten tangled in her hair. "You don't have to do this alone, Majesty. You're not alone."

Was she? Was Stinger here because of anything more than obligation to her title and his guilt? Caine's absence suddenly sat like an ache in her gut. "I'm sorry. It's just..."

Stinger nodded, and gently plucked the glass from her hand before shooing her up the porch steps. "Go on. I'll take care of this."

"Okay," Jupiter whispered and tipped her forehead against his shoulder, and felt the slightest brush of warm fingers cupping the nape of her neck. 

*******

The next morning brought another knock at the bedroom door, but this time it was Kiza with a steaming cup of coffee, and Jupiter was already awake and dressed - bed made, room straightened - having woken in the early hours of the morning to obsess over the sheave full of mineral rights Seraphi owned and the related mines that had hollowed out entire planets to obtain their bounty.

"Oh, thank you," Jupiter said, ushering her in and taking the cup, inhaling the rich, honey-sweetened aroma of it. "But you don't have to do this, really. I can get my own coffee." 

"You're a guest, your Majesty," Kiza said, sitting gingerly on the edge of the bed, stiff and formal. "I know my manners and my place." 

"Um." Jupiter sank down onto the bed next to Kiza. "Kiza..." She honestly had no idea what to say in the face of the girl's obvious discomfort. Kiza had been quiet when she'd come home they day before to find Jupiter there, and Jupiter had been distracted with Dev's tutoring and hadn't seen much of her since. Which was pretty crappy, after invading her home and taking over her space. "I'm sorry. I haven't been very considerate." 

Kiza plucked at the quilt. "You have every right to be here, your Majesty. It is all yours."

The bees in the room began to buzz around Jupiter, agitated. "No, no, it's not. It's not like that, it's..." Exactly like that to Kiza, she realized. Jupiter stared into the gulf between them, Caine's resigned, "You're a royal now, I'm a splice. You don't know what that means..." echoing like the toll of a terrible bell.

She'd dismissed it then; the idea that someone would see her like that seemed silly, considering how many times some client had looked down their nose at her, treated her like a tool instead of a person. But there was something Jupiter was clearly missing, some more complicated in the relationship between humans and splices, between Entitled and splices. 

God, would she ever be able to figure any of this out?

"What did he do, your Majesty? What did he offer you?"

"What?" The quiet, anguished question yanked Jupiter back to the moment.

"What did Da offer you for my treatment? I know he must have made some kind of bargain. All these years he's been scrimping, and suddenly you come along and he just coincidentally gets me a priority recode? I'm not stupid, I know that's the kind of thing only an Entitled can do. But if he gave himself to you, please keep him? He's good, and smart, and I know he's rough and sometimes doesn't think about what he says, but I don't know if you sell his contract, if whoever buys it will understand him, and he's all I have, your Majesty. _Please._ " Tears brimmed in her golden eyes, spilling free as quickly as her pleading words, and she gulped back a sob.

Cold horror cascaded through Jupiter. "Kiza, I'm not going to take your dad away. Oh my God, I would never..." She set the coffee cup down on the floor and took Kiza's hands. "Yes, I arranged for your treatment, but not because of anything your dad did. I promise, Kiza. Neither you or your dad owe me _anything_."

Kiza's glare of outright suspicion hurt but Jupiter met it as calmly as she could manage. "I did it because your dad was kind to me, and because it was the right thing to do. I swear."

Kiza's hands, which she'd curled into fists when Jupiter had grabbed them, relaxed infinitesimally, even as she said, "Entitled don't do the right thing, your Majesty."

"I'm not-" Jupiter ground her teeth against the rebuttal of her title. Denying it wouldn't do anything, was an easy, and ultimately false defense. She would always be an Entitled to Kiza, and Stinger. Maybe even to Caine (and oh, how that made her chest tight and panicky). She let Kiza go and rubbed at the mark on her wrist with the heel of her other hand. "I won't be like that. I swear." 

"If you say, your Majesty." Kiza stood, smoothing the bedspread where she'd been sitting. "Thank you, your Majesty. I am at your service." She bobbed a little bow and fled the room, leaving Jupiter staring at the door, wreathed in an anxious spiral of bees.

When Jupiter finally made it downstairs, after draining the cup of coffee and collapsing back onto her bed, debating the merits of crawling back under the comforter and not coming out again, ever, she found Dev already at the table with a new stack of sheaves. "Mr. Apini has quite a detailed collection of historical documents." He patted the pile. "These should give you the necessary background to better understand-" Dev cocked his head, peering at her. "Are you quite alright, your Majesty?"

Jupiter collapsed into her chair. "I think I'm going to need more coffee."

Dev immediately stood. "Of course. Allow me, your Majesty." 

"You don't need to... I don't need... I'm not... _Ugh_." Jupiter slumped forward, buried her face in her arms.

She heard his chair scrape away from the table. A few minutes later the smell of coffee wafted under her nose, and she peeked out to see the brimming cup in front of her. She wrapped her hands around it and sat back up with a sigh. "Thanks."

"It was a welcome excuse to obtain more for myself," Dev said with a small smile, scooping an enormous dollop of honey into his cup from the jar that lived on the table. "It is a quite tasty beverage."

Jupiter watched him carefully stir his cup through the tendrils of steam that curled up from hers. "Can you explain to me how splices work? I mean, if that's not rude for me to ask," she added hastily, still smarting from Kiza's sharp suspicion; it was the one thing she'd hesitated to broach with Stinger before, let alone after that exchange. 

Something of it must have shown on her face; Dev was almost unbearably gentle when he said, "There is very little, your Majesty, that I would find rude under these circumstances. But I am afraid I'm not quite qualified to explain the details of the splicing process. I can recommend-"

Jupiter waved a hand. "Sorry, I didn't mean like that. I meant, like, I know some are bred for things and sold," the word soured on her tongue, "like for the military. But I also heard that people can hire them, and Stinger works for the Aegis, and I saw other splices on Captain Tsing's ship. And you and Kiza have talked about contracts. So how does that," Jupiter groped for something to encompass the words she didn't want to say - like indentured servitude or slavery - and ended up with a weak, "all work?" 

"Well." Dev sat back in his chair, finger tapping at the tip of one of his curled horns. "Do you want to know the economics, the history, the socio-political climate, the military aspect? Splicing is, as much as Regenex, the foundation of current galactic societal structure."

"All of it. Tell me everything."


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wandered into the weeds while thinking about how the legal and economic status of splices would work, based off what we saw in the movie, and I swear half this story has now turned into "info dumps of how splices work and how gross it is." I'm so sorry.

A week later she sat once again at Stinger's kitchen table, now piled with sheaves and the stack of spiral notebooks she'd brought with her. Two were already filled with notes she'd scribbled in between jobs and late at night under her comforter, flashlight propped between her chin and shoulder as she tried to remember Dev's very condensed, very disturbing and very illuminating summary of the history of genomgeneering.

She tapped her fingers on the edge of the sheave in front of her, the third in a very detailed annotated bibliography Dev had put together to supplement his lecture of the previous week, and doodled little geometric shapes down along the coils of the third spiral notebook she'd started to fill.

Stinger had driven her back into the city last Monday afternoon, after getting Dev settled into the other spare bedroom he had - another thing she hadn't thought about when she'd made her impulsive offer.  She'd spent the whole week in a haze of all the complications her life was developing in just the immediate scale, let alone the galactic one.

Her mother's suspicion had been palpable when she'd left again last night, the "helping Katherine for the weekend" story clearly already wearing thin even though she'd come back last time with cash in hand (thanks to Stinger, and how ridiculous was it that she'd had to borrow money from him to maintain her ruse?). Vassily, at least, proved an unwitting ally there, happy with the cash and eager to encourage this entrepreneurial enthusiasm.  So her mother had glared at them both as Jupiter slunk out the door.

The thing that grated most was no word from Caine. The promised "no more than two weeks" had arrived, and she missed him with a building ache in her chest.  Stinger said not to worry, and she'd certainly experienced the monotonous drag of Orous, but all the things she'd been reading about the complexities of legal and economic status of genomgeneered humans left her jittery and uneasy when she thought of Caine negotiating with the Legion. He'd been bred for them. They'd fucking _bought_ him, and while she'd read that splices could be released from their contracts by fiat of the contract holder, fulfilling the terms of their service debt, or far more rare, purchasing out their gene-debt, a purchased contract splice had no right beyond what the owner of that contract allowed them.

"Splices can be hired without contracts, or for short-term assignments," Dev had told her. "Some are even sub-leased out by their contract holders. In the case of splices bred for very specific industrial tasks, splicers lease them outright, but maintain primary ownership, as most of them are so heavily modified as to be unfit for more generalized use, and their contracts have no re-sale value."

Jupiter had wondered what her expression must be, because Dev had hurried to add, "But for most of us contracts give security and stability, and in some cases, such as advocate Gembel, a semblance of power, even as it leaves one at the whim of their contract holder."  

Caine had been the finest soldier, Stinger had said, that he'd ever seen. What if the Legion wanted to keep him?

She'd asked around that question when Dev had started to explain contracts and purchasing. "Well," he'd said, "the Legion is quite another issue. They are by far the most influential user of genomegeneered stock, and have their own system of contracts and purchasing."

Purchasing. Like they were office supplies.  How was it any better than slavery for splices purpose-bred to a specific task, some so specific that they were, quite literally, equipment?  How was it, when you owed a debt against your very genetic composition, anything more than a polite fiction to talk about contracts and buy-out rights?  Granted, it wasn't like Earth was immune to that, given how many people have had their genes patented out from under them by corporations, and well, slavery was still alive and well in so many forms.

The words on the sheave blurred together and she pushed it away with a sigh, to see Dev staring wide-eyed at something across the room. She twisted in her chair and shot right out of it. "Caine!"  

She skidded to a halt when Caine executed a formal little bow and said a quiet, "Your Majesty." His eyes flicked between her, Dev and the bureaucratic disaster that was the kitchen table. "Am I interrupting?"

"Never," Jupiter said and flung herself into his arms.

That was apparently all the encouragement he needed; he caught her up and pulled her tight against him, one hand curving up around the back of her head, fingers buried in her hair as he nipped at her jaw, her chin, her bottom lip before kissing her.

"Missed you," she whispered, trying not to cling to him, a little overwhelmed at the surge of utter relief at having him there, solid and warm.

"Mmhmm," he murmured against her mouth. "Looks like you've kept yourself well distracted." 

Jupiter glanced over her shoulder at the loaded table and Dev's wide-eyed surprise. "Well, just a little." She reluctantly slid out of Caine's arms and drew him toward the table.  "Dev Scofl, Caine Wise. Dev has graciously signed on as my personal advocate."

"I'm sensing," Caine said, "that there's more of a story here."

"Indeed there is, Mr. Wise, but suffice to say I am pleased to join her Majesty's fledgling enterprises, and pleased to meet you." Dev stood and offered Caine the same kind of formal little bow.  "And what is your position in her Majesty's household?"

Caine raised a brow. "That is a good question, Mr. Scofl." He cut a small, wry, side-eyed smile Jupiter's direction as he took her hand. "May I request a private audience, your Majesty?"

"Yeah, totally." Jupiter stuffed down the immediate idea of a private audience upstairs in the bed, instead following Caine as he opened the front door and ushered her out onto the porch.

"Hi. Welcome back. Sorry about all the," and she waved a hand toward the door, "stuff."

Caine handed her onto the rickety porch swing and settled down next to her, ignoring the alarming way the wood shivered and creaked under him. "Stinger did mention that you'd had unexpected visitors when I commed in to say I was entering orbit."

"Yeah, Dev and his stuffed-shirt asshole boss showed up last week, and I kind of..." Jupiter shrugged, leaning into Caine with a sigh. "I'm really glad you're back."

"As am I."  He tucked her against him, but not before tilting her face up.  "You look tired."  

Jupiter closed her eyes, enjoying the ghost of his fingers along her jaw, across her mouth. "It's been a week." She blinked her eyes back open to find him regarding her with no small amount of concern. "I'm okay. Really. Just absorbing a lot."

She took his hand, slipping her fingers between his, the material of his gloves rough against the webbing between her fingers.  "How about you? Did everything go okay?  Are you..."

"Pardoned and released from the Legion. I am now fully at your disposal, your Majesty." He said it with a small, pleased smile, but in light of everything she'd learned in the last week, Jupiter shuddered at his word choice.

"Jupiter?" The concern returned full force, and she buried her face against his chest.

"What you said, on Captain Tsing's ship, about royalty and splices. What does that mean for you, if we're together?"

Silence greeted her question and she sat back to see him staring out at the cornfield.  "To most Entitled," he said eventually, "splices are tools or playthings. Most will assume I am a passing fancy for you, nothing more than an especially coddled guard, or possibly even a bed toy. Those assumptions mean nothing to me," he said as she opened her mouth to object to that characterization. "I have been considered far worse in my life, and I have little concern for the supposition of those who will disregard me on sight."

"But it's not going to get you in trouble, is it?  I mean, people on Earth can be pretty terrible if they think someone doesn't belong with someone else. I can't imagine how horrible Entitled who feel that way could be."

"You are the First Primary of one of the most powerful Houses in the known universe."  Caine pulled her close, burying his nose in her hair.  "Given that, it's unlikely anyone would risk your ire - personal, political or economic - because they were offended by my presence in your life. But," he said, cupping her face in his hands, "even if it were a risk, I would not care. You are worth anything."

"Caine," she whispered and all but crawled into his lap to kiss him.  His thumb dragged down her spine and she arched into the touch. She kissed his mouth, his cheek, the tip of one ear, which pulled a low groan from him, the sound soft and sweet enough to the tension of the moment and allow her to laugh and relax against him.  "Sorry, I didn't mean to make your welcome home so... fraught." 

He mouthed at the curve of her collarbone, and said against her skin, his voice full of the smile she couldn't see, "That you're concerned about this, that you wish this clear between us?  Do you have any idea how astonishing that is?"

Sadly, after everything she'd learned this last week, she did, a little. "Well, all those relationship quizzes in Cosmo are pretty clear on the importance of communication." Kiza's heartbreaking reaction the week before once again loomed large, dousing her attempt at humor. "You'll tell me, right? If this is ever something that doesn't work for you, or if I ever... I don't want to ever be like them, Caine. I want you to be with me, not work for me or serve me or-" The rush of denials twisted into knots on her tongue.  

"Jupiter," Caine said with enormous gentleness, "I am here for you. Not because of your geneprint, or this," and he grasped her arm, stroking his thumb across her Entitlement mark. "Just you."

His steady certainty cut through the worst of her anxiety and she forced herself to breathe through the rest. She was not alone. She could do this. For him, for Stinger and Kiza, she would make this work. "Okay. Okay. I promise, no more freak-outs today."

"Good," he said, "because I have something for you."  He slid her off his lap and reached down, rooting under the bench until he dragged out a large box.  

"Caine, you didn't have to..." She poked at the box until she found a button that popped it open, and she squeaked in delight. "Oh my God.  Are these-?"

"Flying boots." Caine said with a grin as Jupiter lifted them free and set them on the porch. "That's what took me a few extra days. Quartermaster had a hell of a time finding a pair small enough.  Even most of the smaller splice breeds in the Skyjackers apparently have giant feet."

"Oh my God, Caine, you're- this is-" Jupiter yanked off her sneakers picked up one boot, sticking her hand inside, peering at the fastenings. "Do I just put them on?  

"Allow me."

He knelt at her feet, cupping the heel of one foot to position it and slide the boot on. Jupiter bit her lip hard at the sight of him bowed before her on his knees. Two weeks of freaking out over people looking at her like she was this power-hungry galactic dictator, and here she was with her panties getting uncomfortably damp at the sight of Caine on his knees before her.

Caine nosed at her knee, up the inside of one thigh, sniffing delicately, and the slow curve of his mouth as he peered up at her certainly did not help the situation.  He slid the other boot onto her foot, locked the latches and helped her tug on the gloves before he rose and pulled her to her feet.  She clomped around on the porch for a few minutes, getting used to the feel them and examining the controls on the gloves. Caine showed her how to activate them and explained each function. 

"Your Majesty."  He held out his hand and helped her down the porch steps and out to an open patch of ground. "We'll start with the basics, let you learn to balance on them once the grav field is active." Shrugging off his coat, he rolled his shoulders, and Jupiter gasped. 

In her relief at seeing him, she'd forgotten.  She'd totally forgotten why he'd left in the first place.

His _wings_.

They flared out wide, a rich warm mahogany brown that glowed in the sun, hints of gold glinting among the feathers.

"Oh my God," Jupiter said. With a pleased little smile, he fanned them to their full extension before curled one around behind her.  She spun to follow it as it the feathers brushed against her arm, surprisingly soft. 

"Wow, they're... Can I..." Her fingers hovered over one of the gold feathers, and at his nod, she traced the shaft of it with a fingertip; he shivered slightly, and Jupiter wondered how sensitive they were. "When Stinger said they were prosthetic implants, I didn't expect anything so beautiful." She probably should have; both his boots and his gun were finely-made, elegant in a way that showed as much attention to aesthetic as function.  As Dev had explained, the Legion, and thus the Skyjackers, were in all reality, a tool of the Entitled. 

Emboldened at his obvious pleasure in her reaction, she gently threaded her fingers through the feathers, earning a shuddering, contented sigh. "They're strong enough to lift you?"

"I could do a standing take-off if needed, but that's not easy. They're primarily for precise aerial maneuvering and the boots do most of the propulsion work."  He spread them wide again; extended, they cast a broad shadow across the ground.  "I'm glad you like them."

"I do. They're amazing."  And they were, but the thing that really caught her breath was Caine himself: the lack of tension in his broad shoulders, the subtle lift to them, the confidence that blazed from eyes and his strong, straight back.  "How do you feel?"

Both wings curved back in, both swooping in behind her, pressing her close to Caine, who tucked her under his chin, lips pressed to her temple. "Whole," he whispered into her hair. "Complete."  


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.

 ***** 

It took another week (filled with teasing about her "date") after they gifted it to her for Jupiter to set up the telescope.

There was a flat little ledge over the back of the house, an expansion that Vassily built years before Jupiter, her mother and Nino arrived.  It was cramped, and the peaked roof of the house's second story blocked the sky to the west, but it was sturdy and had room enough for her, the telescope and a guest.  

Her mother sat on the pile of blankets Jupiter had dragged up, flipping through Jupiter's well-worn copy of "Backyard Astronomy." She had been quiet from the moment they climbed up here, her stillness like the heavy, aching silence before a storm, anticipation drawn taut like a bowstring.

"So, what is up there tonight?"  Her mother's uncharacteristic soft tone startled Jupiter as much as the fact she'd finally spoken.  

Jupiter glanced up. In a geosynchronous orbit was Captain Tsing's ship, here for two days on a routine patrol, a courtesy offered by the Aegis until, as Captain Tsing had explained, Jupiter appropriately secured her alcazar. Jupiter had blinked until she realized Tsing meant Earth. 

Beyond that, somewhere between 365 and 601 million miles (Jupiter couldn't remember where planet Jupiter and Earth were in their respective orbits, though she could touch the little button hidden behind her ear and ask Mr. Percadium to calculate it for her), lay the tangled remains of a terrible machine, at the heart of a terrible storm, on a deadly and beautiful planet whose name she shared.

Beyond that... 

Jupiter sighted the scope one more time. "Not much that we can see here. The city's too bright. A few bright stars. Mars and Saturn. Jupiter."

"That damned planet. I told him we would name you Jupiter over my dead body," her mother said with a light air, as if sharing an amusing family anecdote,but kept her head bent to the book and pressed her hand against the currently open page."I told him that, and ten minutes later he was dead." She closed the book with a snap and creaked to her feet. "Sometimes I think Nino is right, and we are cursed. That I cursed him, disparaging what he loved. That the universe decided I did not deserve him, and gave him to his stars." 

"Mama..." Jupiter's throat was suddenly thick, and her vision blurred with tears as she reached out and grabbed her mother's hand. She went into her mother's arms when Aleksa tugged. 

"Oh, child, I don't think he would have ever thought the stars as bright once he had seen you. Sometimes that is what I am most angry about, that he did not wait to see you, and then I feel terrible for thinking such thoughts of him, and then I get angry that I feel so bad."     

Jupiter snuffled a damp laugh against her mother's shoulder.  "Will... will you tell me more about him?"

Her mother's embrace tightened, to the edge of uncomfortable, and then she released Jupiter in a rush, dashing the tears from Jupiter's face with a brisk brush of her fingers.  "Soon.  But now, come show me this planet, the planet, this biggest and most beautiful planet in the skies, even though it is basically a giant orange ball."

******

Jupiter's phone chimed while her hands were covered in salt and club soda, kneeling before the slowly fading remains of a well-dried red wine stain spread across the lush - and of course white - carpet in the Haights' house. She sluiced salt from her skin in the bucket of clear water she had next to her and scrubbed her hand on her jeans, drying them enough to unlock her phone and check her messages.  It was from Dev: _I have information about the contracts question you put to me.  Please contact me at your earliest convenience._

His formal texting made her smile; she could clearly read the "your Majesty" in there, even though she'd forbidden him from using the honorific in messages. Last thing she needed was Mikka or Vladie getting a hold of her phone and seeing that.  

_Give me an hour and I'll call you,_ she sent back, stuffing her phone in her pocket and attacking the wine stain with renewed vigor.

It was their last house of the night, and after she helped them load all their supplies in the back of the station wagon Jupiter kissed her mother on the cheek, gave Nino a hug, and said she was going to stay in the city for a bit.  

"You meeting your boy, hmm?" Her mom had yet to call Caine by name, outside the few times she'd met him, but she did not say "boy" with the acid edge every previous boyfriend had gotten.  Jupiter counted that a significant victory.

Nino elbowed her and hugged Jupiter back.  "Ignore her. Go, have fun," she said, pushing Jupiter gently down the sidewalk as her mom yelled, "Not too late!"

The Haights lived in a condo near the Riverwalk. Jupiter meandered along it, the post-dinner crowds starting to filter out of the restaurants. She settled on a bench, watching the boats ease down the river as she pulled out her phone and pulled up Dev in her contacts.

Dev had taken to a smartphone with surprising enthusiasm, compared to Caine's poorly-hidden distaste, even though he'd agreed that texting was less conspicuous for Jupiter than all of the space methods of communication at his disposal.  "It's very... simple," Caine had said. "Thanks."  Jupiter had kissed him on the cheek and immediately send him a poop emoji.

Dev answered on the third ring. _"Your Majesty. How do you fare this evening?"_

"Very well," Jupiter said with a smile. "How are things out at Chez Apini?"

_"Much the same. Mr. Wise and Mr. Apini test each others' patience when Mr. Wise is not moping about in your absence, and Miss Apini is quite done with it all."_

The image he painted pleased Jupiter to no end."So you said you had something for me on the contracts thing."  

_"I do. But your Majesty, this plan of yours..."_

She cut him off with a firm, "Can we do it?"

His _"Yes, your Majesty, it can be done"_ dragged out reluctantly. 

She'd come up with the plan when, one morning the second week after Caine had come back, as they lay drowsing in bed before she had to go home,Caine had said, "I need to tell Dev soon what my position in your household is to be so he can prepare a contract. What do you want me to do?"  

Sleepily, Jupiter had replied, "But I don't want you to work for me, remember?" and had almost faded back into sleep when he finally replied, quiet and strained:

"As you prefer, your Majesty."

Stinger had shown up outside her house two days after that. "Caine says you don't want to give him a position," he said after she'd climbed into this truck and he'd driven a few streets over to give them some privacy.

"Well, no, because I don't want him to work for me. It just feels weird." 

"Majesty, do you..." Stinger scrubbed his hand through his hair and then started again. "Do you understand that if you don't, the Legion will reactive him?"

"What?" Jupiter gaped at him and violently shook her head. "That doesn't make any sense. Caine said he was released from his contract with the Legion, that he was done with them, free and clear."

Stingers mouth thinned to a hard line.  "Released from his contract, yeah, but the Legion still hold his gene-debt, so it's provisional on him making repayment. If he defaults, they'll repossess his contract and remand him back to the Legion at base rank.  He'd have to start over again. Infantry. Would lose his wings again."

Bewildered, Jupiter stared at him. "But he said he was _done_. Why would he tell me that if he really wasn't?"

He spoke slowly, gently. "Majesty, it wouldn't even have crossed his mind to bother you with it. No doubt he expected you to pick him up on contract and planned to use his wages to pay against the debt."

Jupiter didn't remember getting out of the truck. She didn't remember storming down the block. She did remember kicking the brick wall of the real-estate agency around the corner, yelling, "Fuck!" when pain burst sharp across her toes. Her stomach twisted, queasy and cold, vision tunneling like when Titus' smooth, gentle voice had informed her of what she'd held in her hands, even as she admired the vibrant blue hue of it.

The slam of a car door jolted her out of the memory.  Stinger had pulled up to the curb, and gotten out, leaning against the door as he watched her."You all right?"

"Not even remotely." Jupiter paced back and forth in front of him. "Okay. How do I fix this?  I give Caine a job, a contract?"

Stinger shrugged. "Any contracted title would work. Head of your security. Something like that.  Or you could just pay off his gene-debt from the Legion."

Jupiter cut a sharp about-face in the middle of her pacing."Right," she said, drawing it out as she pulled out her phone to text Caine an apology.  She could buy out his debt.  And Dev's, if he wanted, and Stinger's.  And that of the never-ending list of splices she'd inherited.  "I _can_ do that."

That night she'd texted Dev: _I want to buy out the gene debts for every splice Seraphi held a contract for.  And then offer them actual employment contracts and fair wages or severance. Their choice. Can I do that?  How can we make that happen?_

With an obscene amount of money, apparently.

_"I have completed the detailed inventory,"_ Dev said, _"and calculated the debt costs for each individual.  I am sending you the information now."_

The number he quoted was astronomically obscene.  "That's..."

_"A significant fraction,"_ he said, _"but hardly one that will bankrupt you, even after we factor in your plans for wages and severance."_

That was terrifying in its own way, but if she still had that much to work with... "Okay, so what about all the splices contracted to the House? Like Advocate Gembel? Do I have authority to offer them the same deal, or can Titus and Kalique intervene?"

Dev's sigh spoke volumes. _"That is more complicated, but as Primary you may have the authority to enact such a requirement of the House staffing services. But I do suggest that we do this in stages, your Majesty. A mass contract turnover such as this is bound to draw attention. It makes a statement."_

Jupiter thought back to that morning that started all this, to Caine's strained acquiescence to her careless decree. "Dev, that's kind of the whole point."

_"While I do admire your forward thinking, you can't change the whole universe at once, my queen."_

"No," Jupiter said, resolute.  "But I have to start somewhere."


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is officially now the longest thing I've written!

******

 Caine accepted her offer to buy out his gene-debt with startled gratitude and a faintly forlorn, "But then what am I supposed to _do_?" 

He accepted her mass buy-out plan with less equanimity, though that was, he said, mostly because of the risks to her, contemplating which made him frown so severely that Jupiter said, "Please don't try and talk me out of this." 

Caine blinked, breaking the furrowing of his brow, and huffed a low laugh. "I am fully aware, your Majesty, of the futility of that. I have serious concerns, but no, I have no intention of convincing you otherwise." 

Stinger, on the other hand... 

"Are you out of your Entitled _mind_ , Majesty?"

Jupiter sat in a chair in the kitchen and watched Stinger stalk back and forth, twelve precise steps before a precise about-face, feathers rustling even though his wings were locked down tight between his shoulders. He muttered an exhaustive list expletives under his breath.

He was very creative in his negative assessment of her idea.

"No," Jupiter said when he paused for a breath. "I've thought about this. I've talked to Dev. And Caine. I can do this." Caine, who stood in the doorway between the kitchen and living room, winced at the venomous look Stinger shot him. 

"Caine should damn well know better," he snapped as he spun away from Caine and back to Jupiter. "Do you know what kind of message it sends?  What kind of challenge this will be seen as?"

"Yes," said Jupiter. "That's the _point_."  

"Is that what all this is, an Entitled tantrum to mark your ascendance?"

"Stinger!" Caine said, aghast.  

Jupiter shoved to her feet, the chair skidding back, heat rising in her face. "What this is, Stinger, is that I will not _own_ people. I may not be able to stop the Harvests anytime soon, but I can damn well do this."

"Stop the..." Stinger stared, dumbfounded. "Who do you think you are, girl?"

All the uncertain fury at Stinger she'd held at bay these last weeks, since he held a weapon on Caine and sent them both, however unwitting in her case, to their deaths, broke free. "The fucking queen of the universe, or so you all keep telling me!"

"Sting, you need to back the fuck off right now." Caine appeared between them, strategically herding Stinger back until he'd pushed Stinger right out of the room.

The anger rushed out of her as quickly as it had flooded in. Their heated voices followed Jupiter as she slunk out of the house, an agitated, buzzing escort swirling around her. At home after a fight like that with her mom she'd have gone to needle Vladie, or climbed up to to the roof, or gone for a run to burn off the frustration that thrummed under her skin. A walk along the quiet dirt road that ran the length of the cornfields sounded appealing, but she didn't want to give Caine a heart attack by taking off alone, especially after the concern he'd displayed about this entire venture.

She wandered around to the back of the house and saw Kiza bent over one of the hives.  Some of the bees buzzing around it broke off to join Jupiter's escort, and Kiza looked up as she approached, mouth turning into a slight but distinct frown.

"Sorry," Jupiter said. Already worn thin from Stinger's fury, she wasn't sure she could handle a repeat of her last interaction with Kiza. "I'll go."

"No," Kiza said, discontent sighing out of her.  "You're fine, your Majesty."

Jupiter wavered, but took her at her word.  "What are you doing?"

"Introducing a new queen," Kiza said, crouching down to pick up a small box. She opened it and held it out to Jupiter.  In it lay another tiny box covered with wire mesh, with a bee in it. Kiza took the little box out, murmuring to its occupant as she examined the tiny cage.

"The hive's queen died, and to give a hive a new queen, you have to give them time to adjust to her scent, to make herself smell like the hive." Kiza placed the tiny cage into the hive, fussing with the placement. "So you cage the new queen in this little box that's stoppered up with something sweet, like candy sugar, and put her in the hive between frames of brood comb - that's where the eggs and larva are - and the nurse bees will take care of her in the cage until the workers can eat through the candy," Kiza mimed chomping with her fingers, "and release her.  It gives them time to get used to her, to think of her as theirs. Otherwise, they'll kill her."  

That, Jupiter thought, was possibly a terrifyingly on-the-nose metaphor for her new life. Kiza thought so, too, because her eyes flashed wide and gold and she clapped her hands over her mouth. "Oh beeswax, I didn't mean that to sound so..."

"Entitled?" Laughter geysered up and Jupiter sat abruptly on the ground, clutching her sides as the utter absurdity of it all burst out of her.

She dashed the tears from her eyes to see Kiza, eyes even wider, shoulders shaking. "It does, doesn't it?" Kiza said between her fingers still covering her mouth, and that set Jupiter off again.

"Oh my God, I just pictured Titus-" Jupiter could hardly get out the words. "Titus gnawing his way through a box to get at me and kill me..." She made the same little chomping motion with her fingers and Kiza choked out a series of high-pitched giggles before collapsed down next to Jupiter.

"That actually," Kiza said, hiccuping out another laugh, "doesn't sound very funny, your Majesty."

"It's way funnier than what actually happened," Jupiter said, wiping the last few tears from her face as she collapsed back on the grass. Her sides hurt a little, but she felt lighter, clearer.

"I heard you arguing with Da."

"I'm pretty sure the next county heard it." Jupiter rolled onto her side and propped her head on one arm; Kiza lay staring up at the sky. "Do you think it's a bad idea?"

"Oh, Da's right that it's terribly dangerous," Kiza said. She sat up and reached for the bucket next to the hive, pulling out a gleaming, dripping chunk of honeycomb.  Breaking off a piece, she handed it to Jupiter. The setting sunlight shone warm umber through the translucent gold. "But," and she smiled, a small, but please smile. "I like it."

Taking the piece of honeycomb, Jupiter grinned and licked the honey that dripped down her fingers.

*****

Later that week Jupiter lay sprawled across Caine's chest. It was on the edge of cold in his Sears Tower hideout, but they'd made a cozy nest of pillows, blankets, and cushions, and Caine himself ran hot, and she drowsed in a cocoon of warmth and contentment. "Hey," she said. "So what do you want to do?"

"Hmm?"  The sound rumbled softly in his chest and she pressed a kiss over his heart before propping herself up to look at him.

"When I offered to buy out your gene debt, you asked what you were supposed to do now."

He cracked one eye open, then the other, blinking sleepily. This might be the least alert she'd ever seen him, though his mauler was within easy reach, and he'd pointed out a half dozen sensors and alarms placed in this room alone, so she wouldn't trip them, and the Aegis were once again in orbit. He yawned, cat-like, and rolled them onto their sides, so they lay nose-to-nose. "I'm purpose-bred, Jupiter. I was made to fight, to serve." His breath feathered across her cheek and his pale eyes clouded. "This is uncharted territory. Without a function, or objective..."

She traced along his jaw, across his bottom lip, up the strong line of his nose to gently press the furrow in his brow smooth. "You can just be you."

"And what if," he said, halting, his arms around her gone rigid. "What if I don't know who that is?"

Jupiter kissed him, soft and slow, gentling the tension from him.  "I think you do.  You know you're loyal, and smart, and terrifyingly competent at a lot of things, and you love Stinger and Kiza and would do anything for them." She skimmed her fingers along his side and he huffed. "You're ticklish right there," and lower she rubbed her thumb in the chiseled hollow of his hip, pulling a much deeper, strained sound from his throat. "You like," she said with a grin, "to be touched there." 

She didn't stop the caress as she went on:  "And don't think I haven't seen you scrolling through Wikipedia on your phone whenever I mention something you don't understand. Or playing Candy Crush." A flush rose in his cheeks, as much, Jupiter thought from chagrin at that revelation as from how close her fingers were to his cock. "And you came back for me." 

"Always," he said, thick and low, pulling her flush to his body and burying his nose in her hair.

When he'd relaxed completely against her, she asked, "Is that what you planned, to come back for me, and be with me, to protect me?"

The furrow was back between his brow, and his sigh bordered on plaintive. "It's what I know how to do."

"I get that, and believe me, I'm not complaining, but what do you _want_ to do? Go to school? Play an instrument? Learn to dance? Write a book?" Jupiter grinned. "Take up underwater basket weaving?"

Rolling his eyes, Caine said, "I've never really thought about it.  Before, there was the Legion, and there would always be the Legion. And after, all I thought about was surviving."

Jupiter kissed the hollow of his throat, and his fingers tightened on her hip.  "Well, now you can. Think about it, do whatever you'd like." She kissed him there again and gently bit under his chin before she tipped it down to see his face.  "I just want you to be happy, you know that, right?"

His eyes were clear now, mouth curled up in a small smile.  "And if what I like, what makes me happy, is taking a position in your household?"

"Then you can have Dev do whatever he needs to make that happen. If," she stressed, "it's what you want." 

"Okay." He kissed her mouth and nuzzled under her chin to return the gentle bite before rolling away and coming back with his phone.

"What's up?"  

Caine shrugged, but the quiver in the corner of his mouth as he fought not to grin ruined his nonchalance.  "Just looking up where I can learn underwater basket weaving."


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.

 ******

Jupiter's smug satisfaction at using her "extra wages" for "helping Katherine" as an excuse to buy a car lasted as long as it took to drive the beater Jeep Cherokee (the old bright blue Mustang had called to her, but she'd needed something Caine would fit in comfortably, and the Jeep was the cheapest thing on the lot that fit the bill and still had under 100,000 miles on it), home from the used car lot.

She pulled up in front of the house and Mikka charged out, slid in, and said, "Vladie said since you have a car now you can take me to dance lessons."

Jupiter stared at Mikka as she fussed with her duffle bag. "What?" Mikka said when she caught Jupiter's frown.

"I honestly don't know how I didn't see this coming," Jupiter said as she pulled away from the curb, Mikka stuffing her earbuds in her ears.

Mikka did dance twice a week since she was four. Ballet taught by a tiny, ancient Russian woman Vassily knew from back home (which was the only reason Vassily was willing to pay as much as he did for her lessons) in an old converted warehouse in a crumbling industrial corner on the edge of the city. At least there was plenty of parking.  

"So how's tall, blond and brooding?" 

Jupiter's smile bloomed without even a thought. "Good." Only her mom and Nino had met Caine so far, but she'd seen Mikka and Moltka pressed against the front window on the few occasions Caine picked her up at the house, usually in Stinger's old pickup. He insisted on getting out and handing her in every time, which Jupiter thought sweet but inefficient. Still, it clearly pleased him to treat her so, and so she allowed it, while Moltka made kissy-faces against the window in the background.

"I bet." Mikka waggled her eyebrows and Jupiter made a face.

"Gross. You're like, twelve and not supposed to be thinking about _that_."

"I don't just think about it, Jupe."

Jupiter shot her a wide-eyed glare. "Please tell me you're not expecting me to have the talk with you. And that somebody other than Vladie _has_ had it with you."

Mikka held up her hands in surrender. "Health class and Scarleteen. I'm all good, safe choices and everything."

As Mikka, still laughing under her breath, put her headphones back in and bobbled her head to her music, Jupiter stole another look at her. She forgot sometimes that Mikka was almost a woman grown, not the gangly twelve-year-old girl who raided Jupiter's makeup and snuck downstairs late at night to watch Star Trek with her. It had been so easy, these last years, to let her life slide by in discontent, and miss what happened around her.

Her ascendance had complicated the hell out of her life, but it had also reminded her to open her eyes and see the good in it, too.

She pulled up in front of the dilapidated building that housed the dance studio and tapped Mikka's shoulder. "Your chariot has arrived."

"Thanks, Jupe."  Collecting her bag, Mikka paused, hand on the door handle. "Hey, I know you're busy lately, but do you want to come in and watch?" That last bit came out in a rush and she chewed at her lip.

"Yeah," Jupiter said, blinking away the image of Mikka lying so terribly still Balem's factory. "I can do that."

******

Despite all his hemming and hawing over what to do with his life, Caine took to sleeping in like a champ, prompting Jupiter to ask, as he lolled in the early morning sunlight and grunted irritably when she tried to drag him out for breakfast, if he was sure it was canine and not something feline he'd been spliced with.  

Jupiter clattered down the stairs and slammed to a stop at the bottom when she saw Stinger seated at the kitchen table, back to her. She and Stinger hadn't really spoken since their blow up, other than awkward pleasantries. She slid a hand into her pocket and fiddled with the cred chit card Dev had prepared for her the week before.  Taking a deep breath, she strode across the kitchen and set the chit card on the table.

"What's this, then?"  Stinger tapped it with the tip of a finger, a sharp, precise staccato.

"Enough to buy out your gene debt. Kiza's, too. If you want." Jupiter twisted the hem of her shirt, shoving her hands in her pockets when she noticed. "I didn't want to presume anything, so I thought this would be better than having Dev handle the transaction. I don't even know what you're doing these days. Are you still working for the Aegis?  Are you going back to the Legion?"

She clamped her teeth shut before anything else spilled out. She'd intended to hand him the card and flee, but that would be even more awkward now.  So she spun on her heel and retreated as far as the coffee maker.  When her cup couldn't hold any more, she turned back to find Stinger looking strangely sheepish.

"Thank you, Majesty," he said, tapping the corner of the card against the table.

Jupiter swallowed a gulp of coffee, winced as it burned her tongue and throat.  "You're welcome," she said into her cup. "I'm just going to go talk to Dev-"

"I work for you."

Coffee sloshed over the rim of her cup as she spun back to Stinger. "What?"

The tap-tap-tap of the card increased in tempo. "Back when Dev first came, I asked him to draw up and submit a contract buyout to the Aegis."

A lot of paperwork had crossed in front of Jupiter that first whirlwind week, but still... "I think I would remember having signed off on that."

Tap-tap-tap. "As your personal advocate he has the authority to submit such personnel requests on your behalf, and I _might_ have just let him assume that I was your castellan, and that he was handling a simple administrative formality." 

Jupiter filed "castellan" away for a later visit to dictionary.com and set her coffee on the table. She cupped her hand over his, stilling the rapid-fire tap of the card. "Why?"

Stinger scrubbed his other hand through his hair, glancing away. "I can't just sit idle. And this is work I can do. Was doing. And the Aegis didn't need a Marshall here anymore once you took Earth off the Harvest registry."

"None of that even remotely answer my question." Jupiter bit out each word.

"It made sense at the time," he bit back, yanking his hand from under hers. "You said you wanted me to tell you how things worked. Better to do that in your employ than the Aegis'."

"And you just forgot to mention it?"   

His sudden weary sigh cracked the rising tension. "Would it have mattered?"

Jupiter pulled out a chair and sat. "Yes. I really don't understand, since sometimes I think you can't stand the sight of me."

He folded in on himself, like she'd punched him in the gut. "Some days I can't, but that isn't anything to do with you, girl. I have always thought myself a man of honor. The Legion beats it into you, even as they bleed you dry. And I threw my honor away when I sold you out to Titus, you and Caine."

Stinger glanced over his shoulder at the stairs. Caine stood there, eyes flicking between them until Stinger squared his shoulders and turned back to her. "I regret it with every breath in my body and I'd do it again, Majesty, in a heartbeat, if I had to. And most days I just don't know what to do with that. Or why the hell you want anything to do with me."

There were times Jupiter regretted, just a little, not letting Caine kill Titus when he'd asked.  Not really, but maybe. "Because I know what it's like to do anything for your family. Because you could have sent me packing when we showed up.  Because you were kind to me when you didn't have to be.  I'm done with this whatever it is with us. You know what I plan to do, Stinger. I need you, but I won't have us at each other's throats about it. And I won't be your penance." 

Stinger looked away, but there was relief in his gravel-gruff voice when he said, "I can work with that."

*****

Caine Wise, when whole and relaxed and happy, was a delightful asshole. He was also considerate, affectionate, quietly competent at everything he put his mind to, smart and unexpectedly funny, apparently endlessly charmed by her ridiculousness, and when he looked at her like the stars rose and set in her eyes...

But he was still an asshole, because once he realized what it did to her, what it really did to her when he said her title, especially in that low, rough voice he only used with her, he did it all the time, especially at the most inconvenient moments.

Like lunch with her mother and Aunt Nino. Three months of Jupiter's weekend "helping Katherine" trips had stretched Aleksa's credulity into razor wire, and her suspicion burned so bright one night as Jupiter shoved clothes into a bag for another trip that Jupiter blurted out: "Okay, I have a boyfriend."

The pronouncement succeeded in swinging her mother's laser focus away from her excursions, but now Jupiter had a whole new battle to fight. Which was how Caine ended up meeting them for lunch between houses the following Tuesday. He showed up in tight jeans and a plain, blue long sleeve shirt, ears rounded, his wings a barely discernable lump between his shoulders. Jupiter jogged ahead and reached up to trace her finger around the shell of his ear. The point was still there.

"Wow, space ear invisibility tech, that's cool," she said, and he grinned as he leaned in. The points of his also-invisible canines grazing the soft skin under her ear, followed by soft lips and the warm drag of his tongue, and he whispered, "I am pleased you approve, your Majesty."

And then her mother was there, glowering, and Nino asking him his sign, and he offered her mother his arm and escorted her into the restaurant, where he charmed the crap out of Nino and brought Aleska's maternal hackles down a notch, and doled out hot, sloe-eyed looks to Jupiter, who squirmed in her chair and hoped her face wasn't as red as it felt.  Hours later, having stewed in the memory of that little scrape of his teeth and the simmering heat in his voice and his eyes, they finally made it up to his hideout in Sears Tower. "Oh my God, you are such a jerk." She grabbed him by the belt and pushed him against the nearest wall as she fumbled with the buckle. "Seriously, in front of my _mom_?"

"I do believe your Majesty quite liked it. Besides," Caine cupped her chin. "You spent the whole time being mad at me and not worrying about what she was thinking."

Jupiter narrowed her eyes at his tactical logic, which was sound, but also at least seventy percent bullshit. "Bite me," she said.

Caine's grin bordered on wolfish as he wound his fingers into her hair and tipped her head back, exposing her throat. "As you command, your Majesty," he said against the thrum of her pulse.

His breath on her skin sent shivers down her spine. She wouldn't trade the heady rush of their first days and weeks for anything, but few things thrilled her more than watching him open up for her, like a flower to the morning sun, unfurling the man he'd hidden away for so much of his life. Knowing she did that to him made her gloriously dizzy.

"Maybe your compass really wasn't ever broken, Jupiter," Katherine said one day a few weeks later, as Jupiter sprawled back on the freshly made bed and waxed poetic about Caine, unable to quell the rush of affection that drove out ridiculous praises. It should be embarrassing, but she couldn't bring herself to care.  "Maybe it was always leading you to the right person, at the right time."

Jupiter sat up and said, "That is a load of trite bullshit, Katherine."

"Uh huh," Katherine returned with a grin. "Tell me more about his eyes."

"Fuck you," Jupiter said, gleefully flinging one of the decorative pillows in Katherine's direction, earning herself a delighted laugh.

(She totally told Katherine all about his eyes.)

 


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.

*****

Dev's list only had five books on it, but law text books, it turned out, were enormous.

After he'd wrangled her galactic affairs into manageable shape, Dev started on her Earth-bound ones. Like how to trickle her wealth to her family without arousing their suspicion and dissecting US immigration law for ways to get citizenship for herself, Nino and her mother, after Jupiter explained that situation to him. "It would be embarrassing if you were deported on your own planet," he said, "and not to mention Mr. Wise and Mr. Apini would be terrible to deal with."

Jupiter set him up with access to Amazon and all the law subscription sites she could find, but the five books on the list were out of stock online. Jupiter figured she'd pick them up at Beck's next time she was near one of the locations.  She ended up buying a backpack just to carry them.  

The Loop store was packed. Beginning of the term, Jupiter realized. Students crowded the aisles and she bumped into a guy while she was trying to get one of the books off the shelf, and again after the checkout as she shouldered the stuffed-full backpack. "Sorry," she said, and the expression that flashed across his face, something cold and sharp-edged that almost looked like a smile, sent a small shiver down her spine. "Okay," she muttered as she eased through the throngs. 

Lately, the early fall mornings started crisp, but the day had warmed and Jupiter debated heading up to the Museum campus for a quick trip to the planetarium despite the bazillion pounds of books. She hadn't had this much time to herself in ages and found herself three blocks up Michigan Avenue before she'd consciously made a decision.

Halfway there, she stopped to reshuffle the load in the backpack when she caught someone staring at her from back down the block: the guy from the bookstore. And then he was gone.

Great. All she needed was a pissed off creeper.  She yanked the backpack on and managed to catch a nearby bus just before it pulled away.  She got off two stops later and took a careful look around before she moved on.  She'd just crossed onto the block at the Hilton when the hair on the back of her neck prickled. The reflection in one of the hotel's big windows showed Bookstore Creep across the street. Watching her.

Someone stopped next to him and he turned, and Jupiter breathed a sigh of relief that it was just some weird coincidence. Until the new guy glanced her way and she stopped breathing at all. It was him. The guy from the store.

There were two of him. They smiled, razor-edged and so very cold.

Twins, her brain rationalized as she fumbled for her phone. _Danger!_ shrieked something more primal in the back of her mind. Jupiter slipped through the revolving door into the Hilton's lobby and worked her way through a crowd of wedding party and guests until she had some cover and a clear eye on the door. Five minutes passed and her rational brain had just about subdued the shrieking part when two men pushed through the door.  

Them.

She took a deep breath, hit the panic button Caine had programmed into her phone, tapped her emergency signal on her com button, and tried not to run screaming. Caine has taught her all the signs of pursuit and how to remove a pursuer.  She could do this. Keeping low, she bee-lined for the nearest door back to the street. She glanced over her shoulder just as one of them swing his head and his eyes pinned hers.

She dropped the backpack and burst out the door.  

Jupiter tapped her com button again, panic flaring at the answering silence. Charging across the street to a cacophony of horns and squealing tires, she raced into the and into the Formal Gardens. Cars honked again but she didn't dare look back, dodging around startled tourists. Her skin crawled. This was too open. If she could get into the Field Museum there would be plenty of places to hide. 

A man stepped out of the crowd, mouth curled in a vicious, familiar almost-smile and Jupiter stopped so suddenly she skidded to her knees. 

Had they gotten ahead of her?  Or, oh God, were there _more_?  She shoved to her feet as he strolled towards her and she veered back toward Michigan Avenue, darting again through screeching traffic.

She ducked off the street and down an open alley to cut between blocks and halfway down someone yanked her to the side and a hand clapped over her mouth, cutting off her instinctive yelp of surprise. She kicked out at her abductor and got her teeth around one finger and bit down, hard.

A familiar voice hissed, "Fuck, ow!" in her ear.

Caine.  It was _Caine_.

"You didn't answer!" It burst out with her gasping breath.

"I'm sorry. They had some kind of jammer. I got your distress call but then it cut off-" He squeezed her tighter, burying his nose in her hair. "If we hadn't been in the city...  Are you okay?  Please, are you, okay?"

Jupiter slung her arms around him and scratched gently down the back of his neck. He held her to the point of discomfort, but it anchored her and her heart began to slow its frantic beat.  "I'm okay, Caine.  I'm okay."

A tight growl was her answer and he scooped her up into his arms and they were airborne.  He didn't take her far, just up to the roof of the Hilton, where he scanned the area, one hand on the grip of his mauler, the other clutched around one of her hand.

"What about those guys? What are they?"

"Assassins. Cloned. Adaptable but disposable. Stinger's on them. He'll click me when he's got them all." The tiny snarl in his voice made it clear exactly how Stinger was going to deal with them. 

"I'm sorry I bit you." She lifted their twined fingers to her mouth and kissed the back of his hand.

His laugh was strained. "No, you did the right thing. You did well. I'm sorry I wasn't there. I'm sorry, Jupiter. When your signal cut out-"   A thump behind them cut off his self-castigation and made Jupiter jump around to see Stinger striding toward them as he licked at a split, bloody lip that was strung wide in a feral smile.

"Well, that tears it," Stinger said. "You're going to Ouros tomorrow and collecting her guard assignment." He clapped Caine on the shoulder before taking Jupiter by hers, eyes sweeping over her with ruthless efficiency. "You okay?"

Jupiter hiccuped a laugh.  "Sure. Nice day, good run, what's not to love..."

Caine's fingers tightened around hers as Stinger pulled her into a quick, hard embrace. 

 

*****

The story she concocted about spending the week helping Katherine's aunt out of town - "Yes, Mama, I know it's last minute, but she really needs my help" - strained even her belief, but Stinger refused to let her leave the farmhouse until Caine returned.

"Clones like that don't come cheap, Majesty," Stinger said, voice tight and hard as he laid out four really big guns on the kitchen table,  Dev efficiently clearing away stacks of sheaves and notebooks. "This wasn't a warning. This was an opening salvo."

"The buyout." The paperwork was still wending its way through Orous' administrative labyrinths, but clearly somebody had eyes and ears, or a big mouth. She exchanged a look with Dev. "You both warned me."

Stinger grunted, slinging one of the bigger guns up onto his shoulder, and stomped out the door.

"I admit to some surprise that Mr. Wise would leave under these circumstances," Dev said as the echo of the slamming door faded.

Jupiter shrugged. "Yeah, that was a fun discussion." And by discussion she meant a snarled argument with flared wings, a lot of swearing, Stinger pulling rank and Caine telling him where to shove it, and offering to do the shoving. It ended only when Jupiter sat down on the Hilton's roof with a thump and said, "If this is going to end up with you beating the crap out of each other like that one time, can we move it somewhere more comfortable?"

They finished the "discussion" in Stinger's kitchen waiting for the transport ship Dev had called in, while Jupiter sat on the couch, shaking fingers clutched around a cup of coffee supplied by a wide-eyed Dev. "I'm sorry, but I lost the books," Jupiter said. "I dropped them when..."

"Oh, your Majesty..." Dev's fingers settled gentle, hesitant, on her wrist. "The books are replaceable. You, are not."

Caine had appeared then, pulled her into a tight embrace, and said, "I'll be back as soon as I can."  

"He'll be a better judge of their intentions with that nose of his," Stinger told Dev later that evening, as Jupiter washed every dish in the kitchen, Kiza quietly helping her dry, all three of them studiously not watching her. "And he's very motivated to bring back the best."

Four days later she had her face buried in her second cup of coffee, staring at the useless jumble of tiles on her stand while Kiza laid out "gothzavpa" on the Scrabble board that now shared the kitchen table with Stinger's increasing arsenal, insisting, "Its the galactic standard word for cheesecake", when Stinger poked his head in the door. "Transport's hitting atmosphere now."

A squat ship about the size of the dilapidated barn shimmered into view above the cornfield five minutes later. Bees surged out from the hives to swirl around Jupiter as she clattered down the front steps to see the ship hover about ten feet off the ground, flattening the corn stalks beneath it in a wide circle before it shimmers and vanished again. A familiar figure dropped out from beneath it, boots glowing blue as Caine landed and flashed her a small smile. 

Jupiter squashed the urge to run to him and leap into his arms, because five more figures dropped down right behind him. They were a motley collection; all splices, she thought, all different shapes and sizes, from one that towered over Caine to one who might be barely taller tahn Jupiter, and none of them looked much less human than Caine. Some furred ears here, a pattern of color across the bridge of the nose of another.

Stinger eyed the group with a frown as Caine led them forward. "I called in some favors, but apparently not enough." The look he shot Caine could strip paint. "This is it? _This_ is what they assigned her? This is what you _accepted_ on her behalf?"

Caine's jaw clenched and he took a deep breath. "Sting, you sent me because you thought I'd make the right call for Jupiter-"

"Don't start that shit, pup, and don't tell me you aren't as mad as I am-"

Jupiter skirted past Caine and Stinger, now locked in a heated conversation of glares and wrinkled brows, and turned to the new arrivals. "Hi."

They all went to a knee, though not without a few glances between them, and Jupiter sighed. "Please, up. No standing, well, kneeling, on ceremony around here." They rose as commanded and Jupiter jerked her head at the heated, muttered argument happening behind her. "Any of you guys have an idea what's going on with that?"

The big one, who towered like six inches over Caine and was about twice as wide, grinned as he bowed to her. Even cut short his brown hair looked unruly, and his top canines were enormous. "Mr. Apini is offended on your behalf, your Majesty."

"Got that. But why is that, Mr....?"

"Sargeant Urs Thorskind. Because we're not Royal assignment quality." 

"Because you're all splices?"

"A little, but mostly because we're all rejects," Urs said cheerfully.

"What Seargent Thorskind is saying, Your Majesty," another of the Legionnaires stepped forward and bowed as he said, "we are meant as a deliberate insult." 

Jupiter glanced over at Caine and Stinger, the argument now escalated to furious whispers and fingers jabbed in her direction. She hoped punching wasn't next. "Awesome, so I'm making friends already. And on that note," she stuck out her hand. "Jupiter Jones, reluctant space queen. Sorry you guys got stuck with the Entitled noob."  

The splice stared at her hand, wide blue eyes with pupils that looked permanently blown sliding up to meet her gaze before he sucked in a long breath and clasped it. Caine had clearly given them some idea what to expect. "Jester Pax, Captain of your Royal Guard assignment." He shook her hand once, firm and sharp, before stepping back. "You've met Mr. Thorskind," the big man grinned at her, "and that is Jhori Beshi, Calish Hals and Zethr Talis."

Jupiter reached out to offer her hand to each of them as they glanced among each other and to Jester, who gave a tiny nod. Jhori, the one who wasn't that much taller than her, stepped up first. The tufts of hair on the tips of his pointed ears twitched, and he blinked cat-like green-gold eyes as he carefully cupped his hand around hers. He had little bumps on his knuckles that reminded her of the part where a cat's claws extended. "Your Majesty."

"Any chance I can get you guys to call me Jupiter?"

"None at all, your Majesty," Calish said with a small smile and bow. Rangy and lean, he reminded her of a coyote, though other than an unearthly green hue to his eyes and the barest points to his ears, he looked entirely human.

"-not even a full complement!" Stinger's voice rose out of the murmur of the bees. "What the fuck are we supposed to do with only five of them?  The standard fourteen would have been spread thin-" 

"Sorry," Jupiter said. "He's..."

"Rightly concerned, your Majesty." That was Zethr. As tall as Caine, built like a Mac truck, a faint sheen of blue-green scales creeping up his neck and across his cheeks. Lidless eyes that reminded her of a snake regarded her, and his fingers were slightly cool on her skin as he took her offered hand. "Mr. Wise told us of the recent attack. We are not adequate to the task of protecting an Entitled of your status."

Urs snorted, rumbling, "Speak for yourself, slitherbrain," and she caught Jester roll his eyes and sigh. Ragtag and motley they might be, but she liked them already.  

"Captain Pax, do you agree?"

Jester, too, looked human, other than his wide-pupiled eyes. He drew to attention. "Zeth is right, your Majesty, but I would like the chance to prove otherwise."

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Stinger throw up his hands in surrender when she jerked a decisive nod and said, "Well, then, welcome to Earth."

Later, Jupiter nestled against Caine on the front porch swing, watching the fireflies blink in and out among the wildflowers. Urs' bulk was visible in the fading light as he and Jhori marched a perimeter, and Dev's calm baritone murmured from inside the house as he, Stinger and Jester sorted out the administrative logistics of housing and feeding her new Royal Guard.

God, did that sound weird.

Caine's eyes tracked Urs and Jhori, but he leaned into Jupiter, practically limp in relaxation. "You like them," Jupiter said.

"Despite Stinger's opinion," Caine said dryly, "they're all very capable. As if I'd allow anyone I didn't think capable anywhere near you. And they will suit you far better than the usual rank and file Legionnaires that are usually assigned for royal guard duty." 

"Thanks for not bringing me a bunch of rank and file jerks." Jupiter silently preened that Caine had thought about how they'd fit with her, as much as how well they could protect her. 

"Only the best misfits for you, my Queen." He played with her hair, fingers soothing against her scalp, and she buried her face against his warm skin.

 


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it's been so long! Life doesn't always imitate art, but just derails it. But next chapter is in edits, though I'm diving into April Camp Nanowrimo for an original science fiction romance novella. I'll still plan to get the next chapter out before the end of the month!

*****

Mrs. Malkofsky was an early client of Vassily's. Retired, her kids grown and gone, she didn't need much in the way of cleaning these days, but every Tuesday Mama and Aunt Nino dropped Jupiter off to do a dust and sweep while they went on to the Dornings'. It took her an hour at best, and that only if she helped Mrs. Malkofsky with a load of laundry and a cup of tea, which gave her another hour blissful freedom until Mama and Nino swung back to pick her up. 

Before space happened, Jupiter spent that time in the coffee shop down the street, sipping a mug of plain tea and reading bodice-ripper romance novels she picked up 3 for a dollar at the used bookstore.  She still did, sometimes, but these days she was more likely to indulge in one of the ornate cookies the owner made fresh every morning as she scribbled in her notebook in between texts with Dev. Today's theme was mineral rights on four planets in her holding. Dev kept meticulous records, and informed her daily of changes to her holdings, but Jupiter liked to write the information and amounts down herself. It made them real, if terrifying, when the lowest amounts numbered in the billions after Dev adjusted everything to U.S. dollars for her convenience. 

"I knew it! You are up to something big!"

Jupiter shot up, knocking her chair backwards right into Vladie. "Holy shit, Vladie, what are you doing here?"

"Calling your bluff, Jones. What's your angle, and how can I get in on it?" He lunged around her, almost knocking her cup of coffee over as he grabbed for her notebook. "Holy shit. Is your math right?  How many zeroes are we talking here?"

Jupiter smacked his hands away as a shadow fell over them. Vladie stumbled back with a squawk, his protests cut into short silence by Urs' broad hands engulfing his shoulders. Urs grinned as Vladie went still, and cocked his head at Jupiter. "Is he bothering you?"

"Perpetually," Jupiter said. "But it's okay. I'm used to it."  She sat back down and closed her notebook. "Vladie, this is ridiculous even for you. Sit."

Urs propelled Vladie to the chair across from her and pressed him into it before fading back to his post. For someone his size, Urs blended in surprisingly well; he'd been sitting two tables away, between Jupiter and the door, the iPhone she'd gotten each of her guard dwarfed in his hand.

"What the hell, Jupe? Are you collecting a matryoshka set of giant boyfriends?"

Urs' low growl carried clearly and Jupiter rolled her eyes at him and said, "Down boy," before Vladie either bolted or peed his pants. "Seriously, Vladie, what are you doing here?"

Vladie crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair, the nervous twitch of his foot ruining his attempt at badass nonchalance. "You're up to something. Or into something."  He waved a hand at her stack of notebooks.  "Something big."

If only he knew. Jupiter mirrored his pose and added a sharp glare. "How long have you been following me?"

"Two weeks." That was Urs, who had given up all pretense of covertness. He shifted so he had one eye on the door, the other watching Vladie squirm. 

Vladie schooched his chair closer to Jupiter's and whispered, "Did you join the mob?"  

"Does he _look_ like the mob?" Kiza had taken it upon herself, with Jupiter's blessing, to outfit the royal guards with Earth appropriate wardrobes. Urs sported a look that Jupiter could only describe as hipster lumberjack, but it worked for him.  "No Vladie, I did not join the mob.  Why have you been following me?"

Voice still pitched to conspiratorial, Vladie said, "I found your notebooks. The ones with all the numbers. Like those."  He pointed to the stack on the table in front of them. 

Jupiter grabbed his finger as it inched closer to the stack of notebooks and twisted.  "Found them where?"

He at least had the good grace to look a little sheepish through his grimace of pain as Jupiter bent his finger backward. "Under your bed."

"For fucks' sake, Vladie." Jupiter fought down the urge to punch him, and not a little panic. What if he'd found the sheaves she often kept there? Or the little pulse pistol Caine was teaching her to use? Granted, hiding them under her bed probably wasn't the most secure location.  "Not that it's any of your business - and oh my God, if I find out you were under my bed again I will break this finger for real and a few others - I'm taking an economics course online."

That set him back. "And he's what," Vladie jerked a thumb at Urs, "your study buddy?"

"You disbelieve I am capable of such intellectual pursuits?"  Urs moved quietly for a such big guy; he now stood behind Vladie, arms crossed, sporting a wide grin that would have displayed enormous pointed teeth if he hadn't been wearing an appearance masker.

Vladie grabbed her hand and shot an admirable attempt at a stern look at Urs. "All bullshit aside. Are you okay?"  

Jupiter stood and tugged him to his feet.  She hugged him, hard, then shoved him away. "I'm fine. Really. Now get the hell out of here before I decide I want to punch you for snooping through my stuff after all."

"Fine."  He skirted a wide arc past Urs as he crept toward the door. "I can help, Jupe. Really. Trust me."

As the cafe's door closed behind him Jupiter slumped back into her seat, dropping her hand into her hands. "Why didn't you tell me he was following me?"

The chair across from her creaked alarmingly. Jupiter glanced up to see Urs leaning back in it, watching her. "Once Wise confirmed who he was, it didn't seem something you needed to be bothered with."

"Yeah, other than someone was following me for two weeks and I didn't even notice." She shuddered.  It'd been weeks since "the incident downtown," as she preferred to call her near-death-by-creepy-clone-assassins experience, and she still sometimes woke up thinking about that chilling, terrible smile on too many faces.

"That, your Majesty, is our job."

"It still feels so weird, all this. All of you."

Urs quirked an eyebrow and Jupiter scrunched her nose at him. "You're not weird." She started to shove notebooks and pens in her bag. "Its this whole situation. I mean all of it, but especially needing people to protect me."  She slung her bag over her shoulder and picked up her cup and gulped down the last swallow. The content were cold, but she was never one to waste really good coffee, even now. "I mean, you could get hurt, or worse, because of me.  Because of a once in a million lifetimes arrangement of my DNA.  And that's..." That's terrifying. "That's just wrong."

Outside, after Urs had scanned the street, he turned to her. "I am what I am, my queen. A soldier.  Getting hurt is in the job description. And I have risked far worse for those far less worthy."  

"You say that now, but you guys barely know me. I am terrible at being an Entitled."

Urs laughed, a sound that rolled out of his chest like a jetliner's engine.  "Do you not understand that is part of your allure?"

Jupiter rolled her eyes, but Urs shook his head and said, "You think of me as you think of any person walking down this street. You think I matter. You think we matter. Your buyout of gene contracts, just the way you speak to us as if we exist for more than your service."

"I..."  Jupiter shrugged, vaguely embarrassed by his awe at what she thought was just basic courtesy. "I just like things to be fair."

"Very little of the Gyre is, Your Majesty.  So allow us the honor of protecting this bit of it."  

She heaved a theatrical sigh, but the quiet admiration in his eyes did not fix her unease.  She liked Urs, liked all of them, and the thought of any of them, or God, Stinger or Caine dying to protect her... "I still don't like it."

A familiar rattle sounded from down the street and Vassily's station wagon rounded the corner.  Urs sketched her a little bow with a huge grin.  "I would not expect you to, my Queen,"  he said, ambling away down the sidewalk, as her mother pulled up to the curb.

 

*****

 

The third time that her phone chimed in the span of five minutes, Jupiter sighed and stripped off her gloves. Her mother had given her a blistering earful just two days before about the increasing number of calls and message she got every day while they worked, so she'd been turning it off. She still had her little com button for emergencies.  She gave Nino an apologetic smile and said, "I just need a second," before leaving her aunt scrubbing the grout in the DeGavin's enormous walk-in shower.

Jupiter leaned against the hallway wall and pulled up her messages. Five from Caine, all to the effect that something had happened, and it wasn't urgent, but it kind of was urgent. She called him. "What's wrong," she said when he answered. "Is somebody dying?"

He hesitated, and Jupiter's stomach dropped.  _"Maybe."_

"I was joking." She clutched her phone so hard the case creaked. "Oh my God, is somebody dying? Caine, what happened?"

_"It's not..."_  Caine's sigh stretched out like a rubber band and snapped back with, _"Kiza found out what Stinger did to try and get her the recode. She was, well, not happy."_

Caine Wise, master of understatement. "Is she okay? Is Stinger okay?"

_"Well, there was a lot of yelling. She punched him. Might have broken his nose. Stinger's holed up in the barn, drinking.  I've got Urs making sure he doesn't drown himself in a bottle. Kiza took off."_

Jupiter pinched the bridge of her nose. If she had to start all over again with Stinger and all his crap about what happened... She got why Kiza was pissed, but Jupiter might still strangle her. "Can you find her?"

_"I think it's more likely she'll find you. Calish is on alert."_

Caine was right. Two hours later, when Jupiter managed to duck out without earning her mother's ire, she found a text from Calish, and Kiza right where Calish had said he found her, huddled on a bench half a block down the street. Kiza shot to her feet as soon as she caught sight of Jupiter and Jupiter had to lunge to keep her from prostrating herself at Jupiter's feet right there on the sidewalk. Her golden eyes were dull, puffy and red rimmed, and she had a wadded-up ball of tissue clutched in her fist.

Jupiter pulled Kiza into a hug and Kiza sobbed once against her shoulder before shoving her away. "Stop it!  Why are you being so _kind_ about this!"

Plucking the sodden wad of tissue from Kiza's grip, Jupiter dug in her bag and gave Kiza a fresh handful.  "Come on," she said, and started off down the street, Kiza trailing behind her and Calish mirroring their steps from across the street.

The planetarium was always her spot when she needed soothing, but for once Jupiter wanted nothing to do with anything space-related, so she paid for three tickets to Shedd, handing one to Calish, who melted into the crowd ahead of them. Two soft beeps from the little com behind Jupiter's ear signaled it was safe, and she gently pushed Kiza on ahead of her.

"I'm not always kind about it," Jupiter said as they stood in front of the glass cylinder of the Caribbean Reef. The colorful cacophony of fish spiraled soothingly around the enormous glass cylinder.  "I mean, I think we've worked it out, but... It's still hard sometimes. Sometimes, I wake up, and I think I'm still on Titus's ship, and I'm alone, and I don't know what to do."  She glanced at Kiza. "Don't tell Caine that."

That got her a tiny eyeroll, and Jupiter bumped against Kiza''s shoulder. "You okay?"

Kiza let out a long breath. "No. Maybe. It's just... How can you not hate me? Caine almost died because of me. Titus would have killed you. Da sold your life for mine. How are you okay with that?"

Jupiter shrugged. She was okay with it now. Really. Mostly. "He didn't know what Titus would do."

Golden eyes blazed, pinning Jupiter like a butterfly for study. "That's a load of shit, your Majesty." Kiza sounded so such like Stinger in that moment Jupiter had to bite back a laugh. "Da's not an idiot. As soon as he knew you were an Abrasax Recurrence, he would have known what Titus would be willing to do. He knew he traded your life for mine." The flush of anger faded from her cheeks and she wilted. "I don't know if _I_ can be okay with that."

Guilt churned Jupiter's stomach. Maybe she should have told Kiza herself right from the start, laid it out before Kiza found out like this and felt like a pawn. God knew Jupiter hated that feeling. She let the silence stretch between them, and when Kiza made no more move to speak again, Jupiter said, carefully, "I never knew my dad. He died before I was born. Murdered."

"Oh." Kiza rocked back, surprise moueing her mouth in a perfect little circle. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay. I'm only telling you because I think it might help." Suddenly restless, Jupiter struck off toward the Great Lakes exhibit. "So my mom, and my aunt, they've never talked much about it, but for some reason they were scared that they weren't safe. That I wouldn't be safe. And so they came here. 

"My mother gave up everything. I mean, if it had just been her, I think she'd have stayed. But she had me to worry about. So she gave up everything. Her career, her life really, a lot of times her dignity. For me. To bring me somewhere I'd be safe."

"But she didn't send anyone to their death."

Jupiter laughed. "One day you'll meet her, and you'll know she'd be perfectly capable of it."  She took Kiza's hands.  "Look. I'm not telling you how to feel about this. It's crappy all around, and you can be pissed at him all you want. That's between the two of you. But I'm past it. And I think he did the right thing. You're his whole world."

"I know," she whispered at the fish swimming behind the glass. "That's what makes it all so horrible, I guess."

That broke Jupiter's heart a little. "It's not easy, feeling like you're responsible for someone else's feelings like that, is it?"

Kiza's eyes welled and she dashed the tears away with the back of her hand. "It's stupid. You're the one who almost died and here I am-"

"Not stupid at all." Jupiter pulled Kiza into a hug.

Kiza sagged into the embrace . "You're really not mad? You really think he did the right thing?"

 "I really think that," Jupiter said, and Kiza nodded against her shoulder, pulling away.

"I should go talk to him."

"Caine said he was pretty wasted."

That got her a small smile. "That's the best time to talk to him. He makes all kinds of promises."

"Think you can get him to promise to stop singing that horrible Legion drinking song?"

Kiza took Jupiter's hand, and her smile, while a little watery, still shone.  "It's a deal."

 

*****

Balancing the tray with the memories dredged up from her short-lived waitressing job in high school, Jupiter backed into Stinger's living room and announced as she carefully turned, "Coffee, anyone?"

Three faces whipped to her, all identically shocked despite their disparate features.  Dev, seated across from them, masterfully hid a smile at their reaction.

"Your... Majesty?"  The one in the middle ventured as she set the tray down on the coffee table and started to place cups along its edge.

"Jupiter Jones," she said, "at your service."

This was the sixth time she'd played hostess to a selection of her ever-growing staff.  Accepting their queen's offer of the buy-outs had been relatively easy for most of them, it turned out, once they were convinced it was not some kind of trap or loyalty test.

Accepting Jupiter being Jupiter was proving harder for many of them, however, and Dev had hit upon the idea of pre-screening the most promising candidates he'd selected to build her personal retinue in same way he'd been introduced to her.  It worked, but the whole thing sometimes felt like some weird audition, Jupiter performing a parody of herself for people who looked at her and saw a completely different woman with her face.

Later, Jupiter carried the tray back into the kitchen and set it in the counter with a thump.  Dev, Caine and Stinger had all approved of this plan, they'd all said it made sense, was necessary even, to make sure she was surrounded by people capable of dealing with her unusual circumstances,  but sometimes Jupiter still felt like a selfish heel for pushing the splices' boundaries on top of the upheaval she'd created in Seraphi's empire.

But she just couldn't bring herself to play the part of Entitled queen in her own - well Stinger's - home. 

"Am I really that bad?"  The cooling, untouched cups of coffee said nothing, but Zethr replied: "You unnerve them." He melted out of the shadows and she was proud that she didn't jump.  By far the quietest of her little guardian quintet, he'd never yet spoken to her when not spoken to first.  Jupiter wondered how much that was him, and how much was her being, well, her.

Jupiter sighed.  It's not like she didn't know that, but having it stated so baldly was more of a gut-punch than she'd expected. Caine, Dev and Stinger and Urs aside, her household expected a queen that Jupiter just wasn't sure she could provide. "Do I unnerve you?"

Zethr's mouth quirked. "Not so much anymore. Not once I saw how different you were from her."

Her. Jupiter's cosmic twin, her dark mirror. "Seraphi? You knew her?"  

Reptilian eyes regarded her, unblinking, and Jupiter thought, calculating. "Not as such, but I did royal guard duty for an associate of hers when I first entered the Legion, which was not long before she died."

Jupiter busied herself with emptying and washing the untouched cups.  She'd known from the moment she walked into that room that none of the three would be comfortable joining the farmhouse staff.  "When they looked at me," she splattered soapsuds on the counter as she waved her hand in the direction of the sitting room.  "What do they see?  What did you see?"

"Eternity," he said. "Even among the Entitled Seraphi Abrasax was ageless. The scale of her experience is not something that anyone can really comprehend, and to most she appeared as cold and terrifying as the Gyre itself, an endless expanse of unfathomable, unforgiving darkness."  He picked up the cups that Jupiter had washed and began to dry them. "Everyone says that recoding doesn't impact personality, but many Entitled are disconnected from reality in ways that don't speak  to just their financial and social status."

"Everyone wants more time," Jupiter said. "Would kill for it, but how many have any idea of what to do with that much of it?" 

"A lesson learned far too late for most of them." The rasp of his voice, like a slight breeze through dry leaves, softened.  "But when I saw her, there were moments, just glimpses of something more behind her eyes, something alive, truly alive, truly awakened.  As if she had gone so far past the bonds of her humanity that she'd been reborn, like the universe stretched to its limit and crushing back to that single point to re-create itself."

Dozens more questions crowded up and died on Jupiter's tongue. Washed away by the memory of the agony and the rage in Balem's eyes.  Would he have followed that path, recreated himself anew, with more time?  "I'm not sure I'll ever get past them looking at me and seeing someone else." 

Cool fingertips settled on her wrist, brushing away glimmering soap bubbles with extraordinary gentleness. "We see you."


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.
> 
> _“What kind of scale compares the weight of two beauties, the gravity of duties, or the ground speed of joy? Tell me, what kind of gauge can quantify elation? What kind of equation could I possibly employ?” -Ani DiFranco_

"Where are you going?" Caine's arms tightened around Jupiter as he nuzzled sleepily against her breast. She wanted nothing more than to sink back down into their nest of blankets and let Caine keep doing that, but peeing the bed would probably ruin the moment.

"Bathroom," she said. He grunted, but let her go. Jupiter grabbed his t-shirt from the end of the bed, pulled it on, and opened the door. And stopped.

"Uh, hi," she said to Urs, who stood across from the door, his bulk filling most of the hallway. His head dipped in a nod.  Then, to her right she heard, "Good morning, your Majesty." And there was Jester, posed at crisp attention. 

Behind her, the bed creaked. She glanced over her shoulder to see Caine roll out of it and pad across the floor to grab his jeans. "Hey," he nodded to Urs, pulling them on, totally unconcerned. "When does the rotation shift?"

"Two more hours," Jester said, stepping into the doorway.

"Rotation?" Jupiter managed to get out.

"Standard dispersal rotation," Jester explained, looking pained, though it answered none of her questions. "I do apologize that it is stretched so thin.  A proper royal Legion contingent is fourteen strong, with four at minimum as a close guard, and Entitled usually have purchased security to complement for-"

"No, no, that's fine. Great. Super." Jupiter closed the door and slowly turned to lean against it. She slid to the floor, head in her hands. "Fuck my life."

A soft thump heralded Caine's arrival at her side.  He knelt next to her and pulled her hands away. "Jupiter, what's wrong?"

"They've been out there all night, haven't they?"

Caine blinked. "They being your guards, yes. Close guard on any room you're in is standard op. But it might not have been Urs and Jester. I'm not on the security staff, so I don't know their exact dispersal." He tipped her chin up, brow furrowed with concern. "That's what you wanted, right?"

"No, it's not that. That means they heard. Us. Me. Um, last night when we..." 

Realization dawned on his face, probably because she was beet red and equal parts embarrassed and aroused again.  He visibly bit back a smile and pulled her into his lap. "Jupiter, I know that Jester at least has done royal duty, so he's probably heard far worse, if he hasn't been in the room for far worse. They won't have thought a thing about it. It is expected that Entitled take their pleasures when and where they want, with no regard for who might witness it."

Caine nosed into her hair, huffing a laugh when she muttered, "But I'm not most Entitled."

"True." Caine kissed her. "I'll ask Jester to post the close guards at the ends of the hall from now on."

*****

It started as idle curiosity when a real estate ad came up on her Facebook feed, but three days later Jupiter had looked at every listing in a 100 mile radius. The apartment in the city in that first ad had been cute, a perfect domestic fantasy until she imagined Urs and Zethr standing in the building hallway, glowering at anyone who came by, and Dev had just selected three more people for her financial staff and wanted at least one of them on Earth with him, and where would they all sleep, and Jester and Caine would have capital O opinions about security and fortifications or something, and suddenly she was looking at sprawling McMansions in the suburbs and secluded compounds even further out.

"May I make a suggestion?"

Jupiter yelped and spun in Stinger's rickety desk chair - almost falling out of it as it wobbled - to find Dev peering at the laptop screen.  "Uh, sure," she said, pushing away, expecting him to point at one of the 45 tabs of real estate websites she had open, but he plucked a sheave from the now-neatly-organized array on the set of shelves Stinger had bashed together out of scrap wood he'd collected from the barns. He scrolled for a moment and handed it to her.

"I do believe a more sustainable on-planet residence is necessary, but in the short term, this may suit your needs and address the security concerns Mr. Pax and Mr. Wise will no doubt have about such a move."

The sheave displayed a scrolling list of attributes. After a few seconds Jupiter realized what they were for. "You think I should buy a spaceship."

"Your Majesty, you already own that spaceship." Dev tapped the sheave's screen and an image popped up of a delicate looking ship, almost more sculpture than spacecraft.  "It is the smallest of the fleet, but more than adequate to house your current staff in the manner I expect you will require, with room for expansion. The weapons and security packages are fairly standard but easily up-gradable.  As it was completed right before Queen Seraphi's passing, I imagine she did not have a chance to decorate."

"Meaning I won't be completely appalled by how it looks inside."

Dev grinned. It lit up his face, so unlike the small, smiles he'd bestowed in the first weeks of his time on Earth.  "Precisely.  Shall I broach discussion of crew hiring with Mr. Pax and Mr. Apini?"

"Yeah," Jupiter said, still staring at the schematics on the sheave, tracing the lines with a fingertip.

A spaceship. She owned a freaking _spaceship_.

*****

"So is naming ships not a thing in space?" Jupiter looked away from the small(ish) elegant ship (her _spaceship_ ), floating out in the docking bay, to see Captain Tsing indulging her with a rare small smile. The Aegis had sent an escort for their trip to the shipyard that filled a hollowed out moon - no doubt, as Caine suspected, to continue to curry favor with the new scion of House Abrasax.  Jupiter didn’t really care, because they sent Captain Tsing.  If they were kissing her ass, at least they were doing it wisely.

"I assume there are some who do so as a personal affectation," Tsing said, "but only numerical designations are officially recorded."

"That's so weird. It's such a huge thing on Earth, naming ships of any kind."

"Names do have power," Tsing said, arms crossed as she leaned against the viewing bay wall. "The kind of power Entitled are unwilling to share so casually."

"Yeah. I've noticed." Jupiter pressed her nose against the glass, or whatever the space equivalent was. She could just make out seven tiny figures crawling over the hull of her ship - Caine, Jester and Stinger had insisted they inspect it inside and out, literally, and had dragged the rest of her guard with them.    

"They speak of you often, you know."

Jupiter pulled her attention from the ship, and found Tsing watching her, gaze as calm and cool as ever. "Who?"

"My crew. You made quite the impression on them."

"Oh God," Jupiter covered her face with one hand. "I was afraid of that."

"You take my meaning wrong, your Majesty." Jupiter peeked through her fingers to see that tiny curve to Tsing's mouth had taken up residence again. "The impression was quite positive."

"I don't get that," Jupiter said. "I didn't exactly do much."  

"Sometimes, your Majesty, it is as much what one does not do as what one does that counts." Tsing glanced through the window.  "When Mr. Apini contacted me with the news of an Abrasax Recurrence, I will admit I would not have made the effort but for his request. I have long been loathe to become entangled with Entitled, and the Abrasax..."

"I don't blame you," Jupiter said. "I might have made the same decision. That's a lot of drama, like genetically-enhanced dynastic space vampire telenovella level of drama."

"As such, I, we, all had expectations as to how the interaction would unfold."

"And then I bumbled in and made you all wonder what was up with the weird Earth girl."

"You surprised us, yes. Pleasantly.  We all expected an Entitled.  What we saw was a brave, kind young woman." 

Tsing didn’t seem the kind of person to bestow such praise lightly, and it warmed Jupiter even more for that reason.  "I mean, there have to be a few Entitled who aren't, well, assholes.  Not everyone one of them can be..."  Murderous, horrendous? "... that bad."

Tsing tipped her chin in acknowledgement. "There are exceptions, yes, but it is hard for those with the privilege they have to see past it, no matter the purity of their intentions."

"Yeah, no kidding there.  But I'm not exactly a hero of the revolution.  I'm just... me."

"Sometimes that is all one needs to be, your Majesty." 

*****

The stress of everyone piled practically on top of each other in Stinger’s ramshackle house became obvious the minute Dev efficiently moved the operation of Jupiter’s fledgling empire up to the ship, and spread out to fill the new space. The ever-present kinetic thrum of anticipation and apprehension didn’t vanish, but it wasn’t so overwhelming when everyone wasn’t tripping over each other.

But that first night on board, sprawled in the gargantuan bed in the suite that was as big as Vassily’s house, Jupiter missed the bees. 

At Jester's request, Jupiter designated one of the clipper's cargo holds for her guard to use for training. Even Entitled storage was overdone - the hold, probably the size of one of those big high school gyms was decorated like a Gothic cathedral as envisioned by Liberace (“This,” Jupiter had said to Dev as she stared up at the glitter and gleam of gold and some kind of opalescent gemstone inlay, “is _before_ Seraphi decorated?”). Towering gold columns marched around the room about five feet apart and today Jupiter sat against the wall between two of them, stack of sheaves abandoned at her side as she watched Caine methodically, and she thought a little gleefully, work his way through the first group of potentials hired guards Jester and Urs were evaluating.

"Your Majesty, can I not get you a chair, at least?"

"Nope!" She patted the floor next to her. Jester hesitated, but took the invitation and folded himself gracefully into the little nook at her side.  

"I'm not exactly objective," she said pointing at Caine, who has just put one of the recruits in a headlock, "but is he as good as I think he is?"

"Even after the incident, he was spoken of as a legend among the Legion. I always thought it would be an honor to just watch him like this. To serve at his side..."  Jester shook his head. "I had expected, once the details of our assignment had become clear," he said, each word measured out, "that we would be serving under him."

Jupiter shrugged. "I told him it was his choice. What he wanted to do. If he wanted to run my security, great. If not, I trusted him and Stinger to figure it out. Mostly I wanted him to do what he wanted, not what he thought he should do for me as an Entitled."

Out on the mats Caine stopped the fight with a now sweaty and exhausted-looking candidate. He gestured Urs out to join him, and after some low conversation and a booming laugh from Urs, they dove at each other, a rapid-fire twisting grapple, until Caine did _something_ , fast and low and Urs toppled like a collapsing wall. 

"Whoo!" Jupiter yelled, letting out a sharp whistle and clapping madly, much to Urs delight and Caine's amused embarrassment. The pink tips of his ears were visible from across the room, but he turned to Jupiter and sketched a formal bow before he helped Urs up and they did it again, slower, the recruits watching avidly as they broke down the sequence move by move. 

Jupiter watched avidly too, and not just because the slow motion demo made the shift of muscle in Caine's biceps even hotter.

"You love him." Jester's faintly bewildered voice brought her back from ogling her boyfriend. Jupiter turned to find him staring at her, eyes wide.

"Well, yeah," Jupiter said. "I thought that was pretty obvious, what with the way Stinger complains about the sexual tension and the public displays of affection.”

"No, I mean, you love him as you would a human male. As a partner."

Irritation warred with the always-gut wrenching realization that she was going to probably have this conversation with the splices in her life for the rest of her life. "He _is_ a human male. Not to discount your experiences or anything, but you're all humans spliced with something, but the operative description there is human."  

"You truly do see us that way. As human. Urs said that you... And the buy outs... I was aware that you held us in a regard that was unusual for an Entitled, but..."

Casting protocol aside, Jupiter took Jester's hands, shifting to face him directly. "You are people. Extra genetics regardless. You are a person, Jester. A worthy, unique person who has value to me as such, and not because of what you do for me. Okay?"

Jester regarded her for a long moment before he gently squeezed her hands.  "It's not as if we're unaware of our humanity, your Majesty. Some of us have bought into the structure that classes us as more the animal we're spliced with, either because they have been given no other perspective, or because it suits their desire to carve out what they can for themselves. But we know what we are, Majesty.  We are just not used to others knowing, as well."

Out on the floor an apprehensive-looking recruit faced off with Urs, who grinned in a way that probably chilled the poor dude's blood.  It was like one of those Wild Kingdom specials she watched as a kid.  Predator and prey.

Out here, everyone looked at her as if she were the first, but mostly she felt like the second.  The buyout had seemed like such an accomplishment, but the more she saw, the more she thought about it, it was such a small drop in a vast, cold terrifying ocean.

"Space is messed up, Jes," Jupiter said with a long sigh.

"On that we agree as well."

*****

Due to the potential hassles of getting Jupiter to the ship from the city, she still ended up at Stinger’s every weekend, and Friday nights became a sort of unofficial team huddle night. Jupiter would bring in pizza from Kiza’s favorite place downtown, and they’d all cram into Stinger’s kitchen, plan out the next week, and then shuttle up to the ship. 

Dev looked grave, and Stinger positively enraged when Jupiter stumbled through the front door, arms laden with the pizza boxes, Urs right behind her with the rest. "This does not bode well,” she said, sliding the boxes onto the table and helping herself to a slice out of the top box.  She hadn't eaten since breakfast, and based on the tension in the room, she wanted to fortify herself before the storm hit.

"Titus filed a writ of Exclusion." Stinger spit out the words like a curse.

"I thought Titus was still in Entitled jail?" Jupiter caught the string of cheese that escaped as she indignantly mumbled her surprise around another big bite. Oh, how pissed she'd been to find out that Titus' “incarceration” meant he was restricted to a large, luxurious station where Entitled who had managed to transgress against the true pillars of society - money and power - languished in luxury while they schemed and plotted. And apparently filed paperwork. "Somebody explain what that means in small words, please."

Stinger grumbled under his breath as Dev handed her a sheave. "It's an obscure gambit, but in this situation and unfortunately strong one. I had expected he would start smaller, approach from a financial angle, but he has certainly made a statement with this. A writ of Exclusion is a legal procedure dating from the earliest days of the current galactic inheritance configuration, when the idea of Recurrance was new, and only a few had ever been identified. As you can imagine, even with the genetic advancements and enhanced lifespans available at that time, the idea of what is essentially reincarnation caused an immense amount of upheaval. There were instances of Recurrances being obtained through less than savory measures and through extensive physiological alteration, used to replace an Entitled."

“So they’d kidnap some poor Recurrance, brainwash them, and then the Entitled was horribly murdered in this scenario, and replaced to gain their power?"

"Indeed, your Majesty. The writ of Exclusion was designed as method to prove the legitimacy of a Recurrance's claim ferret out such doppelgangers. A Recurrance who could not provide proof of their legitimacy, through documentation of their identity or support from their children or named heirs was excluded from claiming their estate, and the estate would automatically be rendered upon the recognized heirs."

“That sounds ripe for all sorts of shenanigans in the hands of people like Titus.”  

"It was a slapdash response to the complications of a Recurrance, and gave far too much power to the heirs in every situation. More recent contractual law and increased awareness of Recurrance and the inclusion of specific provisions that activate in the case of a Recurrance into estate contracts has rendered it all but obsolete, but it was never overturned, and has only been executed in very unusual circumstances.”

Jupiter was so tired of being unusual. "So what do we do?"

"We already did, your Majesty. I have been reviewing all of the obsolete inheritance statutes, expecting Titus to do something like this eventually, and was able to file a counter-claim immediately." Dev exchanged a glance with Stinger, before they both looked away to stare anywhere other than her.

 Guilty jerks. “Spill it. What else?”

Stinger finally said, “We didn’t have enough evidence of malfeasance on Titus’ part to overturn the writ, and I had evidence that Titus had already bought off a few key people in the inheritance claims department that administers competency hearings, so we had to get an heir’s marker from Kalique, stating she recognized you as a legitimate Recurrance. Given that she’s first in line to inherit, her approval of your claim holds more relevance than Titus' writ to exclude you.”

Jupiter closed her eyes and sighed.  God, she did not want to add favors to her already awkward proto-relationship with Kalique.  

"I’m sorry, your Majesty.”  Dev said softly. “We thought..."

"No, it's okay, you did the right thing.  Thank you."  She slumped into a kitchen chair and bit into her piece of pizza.  "Okay, so, again, now what?"

Another look, and Jupiter groaned. "Worse than owing Kalique?"

This time Dev threw himself on the grenade. "We think, your Majesty, that it is time you officially present yourself to your fellow Entitled."

Yeah, Jupiter thought. That's worse. "What exactly does that mean?"

"You must be prepared to play the Entitled that they expect."  He hurried to clarify at the raised brow she directed at him: "You may be yourself within those expectations, but you need to show strength, not scorn. Use the trappings of the station. Titus will no doubt expect you to show up as Jupiter Jones, tertiary pretender.  He will not expect Her Royal Majesty, Jupiter Jones, First Primary of the House of Abrasax."

Jupiter stared at the half eaten piece of pizza in her hand.  Deep down she knew this would happen eventually.  That the universe would come calling to collect on the bounty it had given her. The thought made her stomach churn, and she dropped the pizza back on the plate.  

She had the resources - she could wrap Earth in force shields and restrictions, hide herself and her family away from the terrifying world that awaited them.

"He won't stop," Stinger said softly, as if he'd read her mind. "And if it's not him, it will be Kalique. Or some upstart who looks at the unrest in House Abrasax as an opportunity to climb a bit higher on the food chain." His hand landed on her shoulder, a comforting warmth she had to fight the need to cling to. "I'm sorry, Majesty, but your fate was sealed the moment you walked into that clinic."

"Yeah, I know." She patted Stinger's hand. "Okay, so how do I do this?"

"Leave that to me, Dev said.

 


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being the earliest days of the reign of her Sovereign Majesty, Jupiter Jones, Queen and Primary (Recurred) of the House Abrasax, all hail her name and immortal being.
> 
> Pretty much my id wallowing in bite-sized post-movie imaginings, in the vein of VR_Trakowski's excellent "Rise" and gallifreyburning's "The Journey of a Thousand Miles." Posting in chapters because this is the first in a series of which I have smaller pieces mostly already written, and I'd like to post those before forever.

Two days later, as Jupiter left the Wassermans along with Nino and her mother, a van sat idling at the curb, waiting.  Calish sat behind the wheel, offering a small wave as she came down the porch stairs.  "Gotta go," Jupiter said and kissed aunt Nino on the cheek.  She turned to her mother and was met with crossed arms and a suspicious squint.  "Getting into vans with strange men.  Did you not watch all those after school warning shows on television, Jupiter?"

"I'm not ten, Mama, and he's not a stranger."

"Good.” Aleksa smiled, an expression that brought to mind a lioness poised to leap upon its prey. “Then you can introduce us to the not stranger in a creepy van who plans to take you off God knows where."

Jupiter ran through her mental catalog of lies and come up with: "He's a friend. I offered to help him move. Thus the van."  She kissed her mother on the cheek and yelled "Bye!" over her shoulder as she ducked her mother's grasping hand and ran to the van.

"Drive, quick," she said as she flung herself into the front seat.

"Everything okay, your Majesty? Any pursuers I should be on watch for?" Calish asked with barely veiled amusement as he expertly accelerated away from the curb and into traffic.

"I just saved you from my mother, so no sass, buddy." Jupiter settled back and caught sight of two steaming cups of coffee in the cup holders. "Okay, you can sass me all you want," she said as she picked up hers and took a careful sip. "So what's up?"  

"Dev said he needs you up on the ship as soon as possible."

"That sounds ominous."

"He seemed excited.”

Jupiter laughed. “Definitely ominous.”

Twenty minutes later Calish pulled the van up to a series of run-down warehouses on the outskirts of the city. Jupiter recognized it from one of the pile of sheaves under her bed at home, part of Dev’s plan to create a secure shuttle staging area closer to the city.

“Did he buy all of this?” Jupiter said as she swung out of the van, coffee clutched tightly in her fingers. 

“This whole property, yeah.  And I think he’s working on some of the stuff around it.”

The big door to the closest warehouse trundled open with an agonized rumble to reveal Caine, who tucked Jupiter under his arms when she approached and stole her coffee.

“Thief,” she muttered as she leaned into him. “You in on whatever Dev’s got planned?”

Caine steered her to the shuttle that hovers in the middle of the empty warehouse floor. “Nope.  All I know is it’s a personnel issue.”

The shuttle fits neatly through the big warehouse doors as Calish piloted them out and up to the ship.  Caine offered Jupiter his hand, all formal and Jupiter took the cue to play queen as he guided her across the landing bay, where Dev stood with another splice of the same kind as him.  A woman, young, taller than Jupiter. Elegant, like a queen herself. Her hair was a lovely silvery gray, a few shades paler than her eyes, which pinned Jupiter with an assessing stare as they approached.  

"Your Majesty."  She executed a precise bow when Caine and Jupiter stopped a few feet in front of her, her eyes cutting to Dev as she rose back up.  Jupiter wondered what that look was supposed to mean.

"Your Majesty, may I present Kamira Swift."  Dev seemed pleased, however, and he hadn't steered her wrong yet, so Jupiter stuck out her hand.

"Hi, I’m Jupiter.  Nice to meet you.  Why am I meeting you?"

There was that look again, but Kamira took Jupiter’s offered hand, her grip light but firm.  "I truly thought you were jesting me, Devri," Kamira said to a now openly-grinning Dev.  To Jupiter, she said, "I am here to help you, your majesty, in any capacity you need me."

It was Jupiter’s turn to shoot dev a look laden with questions. "She is your new assistant," Dev said. "It will free me to dig deeper into your financial dealings, and Kamira is trained in organization, information processing, aesthetics management, comportment and personal protection."

"Jester said she throws an excellent right cross," Caine said from behind her.  "I approve."

"Do you?" Jupiter said to Kamira. "Approve of this? I'm guessing Dev told you what to expect with me."

"He did." Calm, utterly unruffled, utterly inscrutable, Kamira met Jupiter's assessing gaze with her own.  Jupiter wondered how many Entitled she'd worked with.  How Jupiter would measure up.  It was like high school again, when she'd tried to do drama club one year and found herself paired with the class president, a girl from a rich family who carried herself like the world was laid out at her feet.  She was nice, but Jupiter always felt judged.

This not high school, Jupiter reminded herself, but she was unable to squash the little voice that said, no, it was _infinitely worse_. "What do you think?"

Calm. Inscrutable. "I enjoy challenges, your Majesty."

Jupiter ground her teeth, forcing herself to relax when Caine's hand settled on the back of her neck, thumb rubbing soothing circles over the knob of bone at the top of her spine. "Is that why you agreed to this?  Because I'm a challenge?"

That broke a little of Kamira's cool demeanor.  Her eyed widened, and a little shiver twitched along her ears.  "I agreed," she said softly, "because Devri said you needed help being, or at least emulating, what you hated.  And that you were not the kind to suffer fools gladly.  And I am no fool."

"I'm sorry," Jupiter said, a little ashamed, and a lot tired.  "I’m apparently not handling this new wrinkle in the cosmic fabric of my destiny very well."

"And that is why I am here, so you do not have to bear that solely on your shoulders."

Jupiter mouthed a thank you at Dev, who sketched her a tiny bow, before holding out her hand to Kamira again.  "Can we do this over?  Hi Kamira. I’m Jupiter Jones.  Welcome to the family."

A small smile lit Kamira’s face and she again took Jupiter hand. "Well met, Jupiter Jones. Shall we get started?"  She gestured toward a stack of crates and trunks piled near the hangar bay door. "Based on the profile Devri sent me, I brought a selection of samples to begin building your formal wardrobe."

Jupiter leaned against Caine's warm bulk, glancing up at his murmured, "You okay?" 

"Yeah," she said, before striding toward the pile.  "Let's do this."

*****

"What do you think of it, Dev's plan?"

Caine was so quiet Jupiter thought he'd fallen asleep when he said, "I hate it.  But tactically, it's good. You can't hide on Earth forever playing defense against Titus, and probably Kalique at some point. They'll always be looking for ways to bring you down and claim that they think is theirs."

He was right. Jupiter had rolled the idea around in her head for the last three days, looking for any angle that would make it a bad one.  But Titus had already proved he'd come for her.  Jupiter didn't think he was likely to stop after one failed gambit.  Well, technically two.  "What don't you like about the idea?"

Caine fell quiet again, burying his face in her hair.  So quiet she had to strain to hear him when he said, "I’m afraid for you. Of losing you."

"Oh, Caine."  Jupiter rolled to lay her head on his chest.  "I’m not going anywhere."

"I know that.  Of everything, of that I am certain." He cupped her cheek in his hand. "I fear you abandoning yourself.  Of how far you will have to fall into the role to play the part.  I've seen the vast emptiness in them, all humanity leached away by time and power."

Jupiter opened her mouth to deny it, to tell him it would never happen, but the words wouldn't come.  She was afraid of that, too.  The scale of Entitlement was so incredibly vast, she had no idea, no ability to comprehend what her future looked like. Entitled lifespans the rise and fall of an ice age.  Jupiter could only think of it like a chapter in a geology textbook, the shift and play of tectonic plates giving rise to mountains.

All she wanted was to take care of her people, her world, but what will she have to do to see that through?  How will she navigate the forbidding labyrinth that lay before her?

So Jupiter didn't say anything at all.  Just pressed a kiss to Caine's forehead and clung to him as he enfolded her in his wings.

*****

Jupiter, Kamira, and Kiza sprawled (well, in Jupiter and Kiza's case - Kamira sat with impeccable posture) on the floaty chaise lounges in the salon off Jupiter and Caine’s bedroom.  The trunks lay open, clothes strewn across every surface.  A mini-hologram version of Jupiter, about three feet high, spun around on the low block of glittering stone that Jupiter had dubbed the coffee table, hovering over a feast of takeout cartons from their usual Chinese place.  

Caine had fled hours ago, though he replied with terse "yes," "no" "maybe" or "what the fuck is that?" texts when Jupiter sent him pictures of the various sartorial concoctions they were working through.  

Kamira knew her stuff, and had quickly learned Jupiter's tastes and Jupiter's limits, both for Entitled fashion and Entitled expectations. So when the next dress came up on the virtual model, Jupiter bit back a laugh, knowing very well that Kamira was messing with her.  She'd worried that Kamira, who was so much more formal than Dev or any of her other close compatriots, wouldn't fit into the growing household.  Which would suck, because Kamira had been right. Jupiter did need her.

Even Caine had noted the difference.  "You don't seem quite as frantic," he'd said one morning a few weeks after Kamira’s arrival, easily convincing Jupiter to laze in bed for a little while longer. She'd had a million things to do, until Caine had reminded her that Kamira could handle most of it, and probably faster than Jupiter. Which stung a little, though she knew what he meant.  And it wasn't fair to take out her insecurities on Caine, or Kamira.

"I don't want to just dump stuff on her," she'd grumbled. "That's not the person I want to be."

"There's a difference between being a tyrant, and trusting your team, Jupiter."

So she'd trusted Caine's advice, and trusted Kamira's experience, trusted Dev's wisdom in adding her to the team, and within a couple of weeks realized she could breathe a little better for the first time since she'd stepped through the doors of the fertility clinic. 

Kiza broke off a piece of fortune cookie and tossed it to Jupiter through her mini holographic doppelganger, making it break apart and slide back together. "That one's a little... floofly." 

The dress holo-Jupiter modeled was really floofy - like a disembodied torso floating on a gossamer cloud. A transparent ghostly cloud, the effect achieved, according to the sartorial guide on Jupiter's sheave, by a cunning manipulation of mirrored micro-something or other and cloaking technology.

She snapped a picture and send it to Caine, who replied back: _That's fucking creepy_. Jupiter agreed and tapped the sheave.  "Next!"

Holo-Jupiter spun another slow circle as she dematerialized and rematerialized in a new dress. 

"Oh!"  Kiza sat straight up, reaching out as if to touch it. "That one. Totally that one." 

Jupiter glanced between Kamira's serenely smug smile and the dress.  A pale gold fitted bodice that flowed into a full skirt, the color darkening to almost a glittering black at the hem. Tiny sparkling hexagonal stones of shades gold scattered across the fabric. Structured short sleeves made of translucent gold hexagons.  "You're biased," Jupiter said to a bouncing Kiza (“No, I’m bee-assed!” she said through a snorted laugh, earning a fortune cookie bounced off the side of her head from Jupiter and a sigh with a barely restrained sly smile from Kamira), but she agreed. It was perfect. It was gorgeous, and the subtle bee theme was perfect.  It was, Jupiter had to admit, both very her, and very Entitled.  "Okay, definitely yes on that one."

“Your choice of understated themes is likely to up-end the sartorial world across a half dozen systems." Kamira said. "The design houses won't know what to do with themselves when orders start rolling."

Jupiter choked back a laugh.  Possibly of all of this, Jupiter Jones, fashion trendsetter, was the most unbelievable thing she'd heard. "Good thing I've moved on from my 80s phase."

Kamala regarded holo-Jupiter. "I think we should present you on Ourous soon. Something small, just to start the whispers."

"Wait," Jupiter said. "We want to start rumors?"

The bee-toned dress faded away and another appeared, something simple and blue that Jupiter immediately liked. She selected it on her sheave and Kamala's sheave beeped happily in response.  

"Excellent choice," Kamala said. "As for the rumors are already well-entrenched, your Majesty. We want to direct them, shape them to our needs and advantage. Information is as powerful as money, and in the wrong hands, far more deadly than any assassin."

A whole new map of complications and implications unfolded in the back of Jupiter's mind as holo-Jupiter changed again, now sporting a ridiculously over-structured jacket.  A whole new landscape she needed to navigate.  Slumping back against the divan, she tossed the sheave aside and stuffed an egg roll in her mouth, chewing angrily. Every time he thought she had even the tiniest grip on all of this, something else rolled in to send her scrambling.  

The divan bobbed slightly as Kamira sat next to her. "You've done well, Jupiter. And you will weather this, too."

Fashion expert, information specialist, and apparently mind reader. "You should be in charge," Jupiter said.  

"And I thought you liked me," Kamala said primly, but a smile ghosted around her lips.  "Shall I coordinate with Devri and Mr. Apini regarding an appropriate venue for your pre-debut?"

"Sure," Jupiter said.  Pointing at the jacket, she added, "But I'm not wearing that."

*****

Moltka's half-eaten bowl of corn flakes sat forgotten and soggy on the floor next to him.  He was stretched out next to Jupiter, the PlayStation 4 controller gripped tight in his hands.  Jupiter had brought the system home a few weeks ago, earning raised eyebrows.  She insisted she'd gotten it second hand - the little lies she concocted to explain her moments of largess came too easily anymore - a trade for helping a friend move.  "You know, Mama, the one in the van who you thought was an ax murderer?"

She'd been slipping new games into his collection, too, one every few days, hiding them among the clutter of the bookshelf that held a hodgepodge of books, CDs, Vladie's disco vinyl collection, and a bunch of 8 tracks. Jupiter worried about him: he was the quiet weird kid at school, with the weird immigrant family.  It never seemed to bother him, but Jupiter knew all about keeping her heart's desires held tight in this house, and the venom of the world outside of it, how it burned through your veins and ate away at your bones.  

So when Moltka had asked her, as she was on her way out the door this morning to start her other life's work for the weekend, to play MarioKart, she'd hesitated for only a moment before sending a group text to Caine and her Guard that she'd be delayed for a couple of hours.

They lay in front of Vladie's big TV, moved upstairs into the family room as penance for his poor decision making and his dad having to bail him out it, Moltka totally trashing her at Mario Kart, when he bumped her shoulder with his and said, "So is your boyfriend from outer space?"

Baby Mario careened across a candy-colored bridge and sailed off the side. Jupiter gripped the controller so hard the casing creaked.  "What?"

"From space, like the big dragon guys who zapped everyone. Though I don't remember a lot after that."  

Jupiter swallowed the "Oh, fuck me" that was desperate to burst forth. This was not how she'd imagined the reveal going down. She opened her mouth to deny it, tell him he was imagining things, that it was ridiculous, right?  But Moltka stared at her, eyes wide and earnest, and she couldn't do it. A little weight lifted from her. Someone knew. Someone believed her.  

"Moltka..." She took a breath. "Have you told anyone else about the dragon guys?"

He gave her an eyeroll worthy of Mikka's teenage skill.  "Really, Jupiter?"

"Okay, okay," she said. "Yes. Caine is from outer space."

"So cool.  Has he taken you to space?"

Jupiter nodded and Moltka's eyes were saucers.  "Can you take me to space?"

She should have seen that coming. Thankfully he didn't remember he already been in space. "Someday, but there's a lot of stuff going on right now that I have to figure out first."  The disappointment clouding his face kicked her in the gut, so she added, "When I can take people, you'll be the first. I promise."

"What's it like?"

Terrifying. Exhausting. Exhilarating. "It's amazing, Moltka.  There's so much out there...  I'll show you, I promise, but you can't tell anyone yet.  Not friends, not anybody, okay?"

He held out his fist. "Our secret. I promise."

Jupiter curled her fingers together and tapped his fist, then dragged him into a hug. 

*****

It was a mild enough day, but the heat in her muscles from their darting chase across the skies had faded once they settled onto the perch a few floors above Caine’s little hideout, and this high up the March wind cut through her parka. She snuggled closer to Caine, who obligingly curled a wind around her shoulders though his eyes never left the mass of dark clouds sliding across the lake, far on the horizon. 

They were due to leave for Orous in two days for her mini-debut, and Jupiter had woken up that morning, told Kamira to clear her schedule, and dragged Caine out of bed and said, “We’re having date night.  Well, date day.”

He'd been quiet all day, though. Attentive and content, but more contemplative than she was used to. She'd learned to just let him sit, and not push. He always talked when he was ready. 

So instead she kissed him, and warmed her hands under his shirt, inching down to his belt where she wiggled her fingers into the waistband of his pants. 

Jupiter opened her mouth to say, "Let's go inside, because those pants are coming off," when he blurted, "I want to be named your Consort."

"What?"

"You asked me what I wanted, what I wanted to do, to be. That's what I want to do. To be. For you. With you." 

The warmth in her belly spread, less horny and more fluttery. "Caine, are you asking me to marry you, or are you asking me to ask you?"

Confusion crossed his face. "Maybe? It's a political designation. A title. It does not allow for direct inheritance, like marriage but it does give me status as your recognized partner. No one would be able to bar me from accompanying you anywhere. I had Dev look into it, and even though I'm a splice, they can't bar me from that status."

That fluttery thrill collapsed like a deflating balloon. "Oh." She forced out, "Okay. Uh, sure. That's fine."

Caine cocked his head. "Jupiter, do you want that? For us to formally pledge to each other?"

Set in front of her like that so baldly, it was suddenly huge and terrifying. "Yes? But what you described sounds very… contractual. I want…” Flowers and a pretty dress and promises much deeper than a political designation. But maybe that was too frivolous in her new life.  Maybe she should be content with what Caine offered, grateful he wanted even that much. 

He pulled her all the way into his lap. "It is, but I am already yours. Everything that I am. My heart. My soul. I have been right from the moment I saw you. I love you, Jupiter."

The earnestness in his voice cut through all the weirdness swirling around in her head. Screw flowers and strange space contracts. She had everything she needed, everything she wanted, right here.  Jupiter flung her arms around his neck. “Okay. So what do we do?"

"There's paperwork." Caine huffed a laugh as she rolled her eyes and yelled out, "Of course there's paperwork!" to the uncaring gulls that rode the currents above them.

"And Consorts wear a marker."

"What kind of marker?"

"The pattern is distinctive, much like the signifying bond, but it's not permanently inscribed on the body. More like a ring, or arm cuff."

Jupiter picked up his hand and slid her fingers through his.  "A ring would probably interfere with your gloves, right? So maybe the armband?"

Caine swallowed hard. "A... a collar is also traditional."

Jupiter got a little dizzy. "Oh. Okay. That sounds-" So hot, holy crap "-nice." She slid her hands up his chest, spanned them around his throat. His pulse thundered under her thumbs, and she pressed a kiss there, followed by a sharp nip. "That would be pretty noticeable."

The steady certainty in his eyes was even hotter. "I know."

"Is that what you want, Caine?  For everyone to know you're mine? "

" _Please_."

"My Consort," she whispered against his jaw, trying out the sound of the word, and Caine shuddered. “Okay, yes. But on one condition.”

“Anything.”

Jupiter untangled herself from his arms and wings and sat up to straddle his lap. Cupping his face in her hands, she said, “Marry me. Here, on Earth. Not for politics, or safety.”

"Then why?"

"Because I love you, too. And I want everyone to know that. Especially you."

Caine stood, scooping her into his arms with a grin. "I do," he said, and leaped off the edge, the wind catching his wings and Jupiter's startled yell as he rode the updrafts that buffeted the tower, spiraling up and up into the bright sunlight.

 

 


End file.
